


The Mask and Margherita

by MalevolentMagpie



Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - Phantom of the Opera Fusion, Drama, Eventual Smut, F/F, Happy Ending, Implied/Referenced Torture, M/M, Minor Character Death, Pining, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Romance, Sign Language, Switching, Threats of Rape/Non-Con
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-04-20
Updated: 2020-06-16
Packaged: 2021-03-01 18:20:39
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 20
Words: 74,696
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23751466
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MalevolentMagpie/pseuds/MalevolentMagpie
Summary: Phantom of the Opera AU.Global idol and musician Akira returns to his roots to perform at the Paris Opera, coached by a mysterious mentor from the shadows who lives beneath the opera house.
Relationships: Allura/Pidge | Katie Holt, James Griffin/Lotor (Voltron), Keith/Shiro (Voltron)
Comments: 77
Kudos: 67





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

  * Inspired by [Your Constellation Prize](https://archiveofourown.org/works/16898082) by [rosegardenlake](https://archiveofourown.org/users/rosegardenlake/pseuds/rosegardenlake). 



> I dedicate this to the author of my favorite fanfic of all time, “Your Constellation Prize” (as well as of my second favorite fanfic of all time, “Where the Light Doesn’t Reach”). This fic isn’t so much inspired by that one as it is an homage AU of her/his AU. Also, shout-out to my AMAZING beta reader [Maryliz2121](/users/Maryliz2121/), who with her thoughtful, insightful commentary and enthusiasm both made this work better and kept me sane! Go check out her Klance AU ideas!
> 
> Warning: I’m not aiming to attenuate the dark sides of the Phantom just because it’s Shiro. If you’re uncomfortable with morally gray characters getting happy endings, please be advised. I also make no claims that Keith and Shiro’s relationship in this is a healthy one or an unhealthy one; this is a fantasy story to satisfy our Sheith Trash desires. That being said, I think you'll find the Sheith in this story is pretty damn wholesome. 
> 
> Additional disclaimer: I am no authority on panic attacks, PTSD, body dysmorphia, the French legal system, opera, architecture, Deaf culture, history, anal penetration, basically anything I write about here, so please forgive me if I get something wrong (and/or flame me in the comments!). I’m playing fast and loose with literally everything except my relatively in-depth knowledge of being in an orchestra. If you are a Parisian who has actually visited the Palais Garnier and knows the actual layout and how the business actually runs... I am just, So Sorry. Prepare to read the fanfic equivalent of those creationist museums with cavemen existing at the same time as dinosaurs.
> 
> The work is already finished, so I promise you that you definitely won't be left hanging. I'll be aiming to update on Tuesdays and Fridays, and if something happens such that I can't stick to these two days, then I will for sure upload at least 1-2 times a week, depending on how the last bit of editing goes.

It was a lazy, warm autumn afternoon when the rumors were confirmed. Paris was awash in the iconic golden glow that artistes manqué loved to portray on postcards sold to tourists along the Seine. The great golden angels and Apollo's harp shone peacefully atop the Palais Garnier, belying the cacophony inside. Within the opera house, the orchestra played and ballerinas leapt in careful synchrony as a pale-haired singer at the edge of the stage masterfully carried the melody. Then the auditorium doors opened. Across the immense stage and the orchestra pit that flanked it, performers, stagehands, and instrumentalists alike quickly quieted down from the musical din that had been filling the grand theater and turned to watch the familiar boots of the opera house manager stride down the aisle, followed by two strangers.

“What's Iverson doing here? He never steps foot in the dojo during Battle Training,” an irreverently loud whisper echoed across the silence: a stagehand was leaned against the pit wall and conspiratorially close to a pudgy bassist wearing a mustard-hued headband.

“Lance, shu-ut u-up,” the bassist returned under his breath in nervous sing-song. “And stop calling it that!”

“Monsieur Iverson, if you please! We are _rehearsing_ ,” came a high-strung voice from the front of the pit. A shaggy mop of red hair popped up from the other side of the low wall separating the orchestra from the audience seating. An equally bushy red mustache quivered in quiet indignity.

“Coran, our musical director,” explained Iverson to the two strangers with a sweep of his arm. Turning, he addressed the rest of the company. “Ladies and gentlemen, your attention, please. My apologies for the interruption. You may have heard for some weeks... rumors that I will be leaving the Opera Populaire. I can now tell you that these are all true, and am pleased to introduce you to your new managers, Monsieur Zarkon and Madame Haggar.”

Monsieur Zarkon was an imposing figure, seemingly 7 feet tall and built like a brick wall. He wielded a cane with an opulent onyx lions-head that in his claw-like hand looked more like a weapon than any sort of necessary walking aid. Madame Haggar, who stood to the side and slightly behind Zarkon, though too close to be merely a business partner, seemed meek in comparison. Waifish and much shorter than her husband, she looked like the type of person whom one could easily underestimate at their own peril, but exactly once.

Titters washed like a wave over the company. At the edge of the great velvet curtains, one small figure with oversized glasses smugly held out their hand as Lance, out of breath from sprinting to the wings, forked over a handful of bills with a grumble.

Zarkon stepped up then, and in a voice as imposing as his profile boomed out, “It is our honor to take over the esteemed Opera Populaire, the brightest jewel in the city’s crown. We would also like to take this opportunity to announce our partnership with a new benefactor, who wishes to remain nameless yet has already pledged a generous sum towards our beloved opera house.”

At this, even louder titters arose from the company. Not even the cold, unfeeling way in which Zarkon had said the word ‘beloved’ seemed enough to quell the excitement.

"He calls himself 'Raoul' in their correspondences,” muttered the bespectacled figure out of the corner of her mouth while counting the bills in her hand.

“One: who are you talking about? And two, how do you even know that, Pidge?” Lance narrowed his eyes in suspicion.

“The mysterious benefactor,” replied Pidge without so much as a glance at the lanky stagehand. “Says he’s stepping up now with the dough so as to make sure the opera house stays afloat during this period of transition, though in much prettier language of course. And I know all this because I have my ways. It's really weird though: even with my -as you always say- ‘god-like hacking skills,’ I can't seem to find any more information than just this one name.”

“He doesn't leave a paper trail?”

“More like, that's all he leaves. No email, no calls. His only form of communication with Iverson and the Gruesome Twosome is paper, and analog never has been my forte.” Pidge frowned. “There's not even postage I can track, or a courier I can blackmail. I had to find out his name secondhand through Iverson’s and our new managers' correspondence _to each other_. It's like he just-”

But at that moment she promptly shut her jaw so tight it clacked, because the managers in question were slowly strolling in Pidge and Lance's direction. Iverson led them, introducing a performer here and there.

“And this, of course, is our shining headliner, Akira. Child classical-music prodigy, tragically orphaned, world-famous rockstar, and now contracted with us for an extended engagement – a return-to-roots genre-busting project between the amazing Akira and the renowned, historic Opera Populaire!” Iverson finished with a flourish and a chuckle.

The object of his monologue did not seem nearly as amused upon hearing ‘tragically orphaned.’ Fair, delicate features were currently contorted into a scowl as sharp as his violet eyes. Long platinum hair cascaded over the red-silk kimono he was currently wearing for dress rehearsal.

“Ah yes, the ‘Amazing’ Akira,” Haggar repeated, much less enthusiasm in her voice than Iverson had managed. “We look forward to the great success of this venture. Truly, modern times call for… creative thought projects. Who would have thought anyone would live to see the day that a... rock star... _graced_ the 144-year-old halls of the seat of classical opera worldwide? Let us hope the combined star power of you and the Palais is enough to revitalize the waning public interest in opera.” With one last appraising look, she added, “At least looks-wise he's certainly sufficient,” before sweeping past him and looking around. “And where is your primo uomo, Griffin?”

“Ah, James-?” Iverson stuttered out, clearly unprepared for her attitude towards Akira.

A handsome young man with golden-blond hair stepped forward before Iverson could continue, cocky smile armed and aimed directly at Akira as he answered her. 

“Madame Haggar, I take it you are a fan?”

“Son of the great Catherine Griffin, no? The First Lady of Opera, the Fairy of the Bolshoi, the Voice beneath the Waters. Your pedigree is of much renown. Monsieur Zarkon and myself are eager to do whatever we can to aid you in your triumphant career trajectory. I hear that you have been leading tenor for five seasons...”

Akira stormed off without staying to hear any more of Haggar's obsequious flattery. Before he could disappear backstage, however, he felt a hand on his bicep and turned to see Pidge wearing an understanding, gentle smile. “Stay,” she whispered.

Crossing his arms, he huffed and flipped over one palm for the water bottle she offered him.

“Who even uses the term ‘rock star’ anymore,” she muttered, earning a chuckle for her efforts. “Your music could best be described as ‘incandescent pop’--Oof! How dare you punch a _girl?”_

He smirked in return, ignoring the melodramatic way she rubbed her arm and feigned outrage. 

In center stage, Haggar and Griffin were getting along swimmingly, and she was now coaxing him to regale them with the aria meant for Akira. The blond diva made the barest of token denials before caving and gesturing to Coran to start up the orchestra. 

“Maestro?” 

With an indignant huff, Coran tapped his conductor’s baton and bid the musicians turn to the corresponding page in the score. The aria was a slow, romantic piece that allowed its singer to show off an impressive range, but called for a sweet soft touch, as it spoke of the bittersweetness of unrequited love. James Griffin’s voice was called many things by fans and critics alike, but neither group called it ‘sweet.’ He sang powerfully, almost disdainfully - the lyrics clashing painfully with the tone and energy he put into his performance. 

In the wings, Akira and Pidge shared meaningful glances and a snicker or two when the occasional high note was hit just a little too vigorously by Griffin. The aria was just reaching a climactic crescendo when from upstage came a woman’s shriek. Not a second later, a great wooden beam - part of the set - came crashing down from on high, just narrowly missing Griffin where he stood. 

The stage and pit alike erupted in gasps and exclamations. Several of the chorus line rushed to James’ side. Others skittered away, as if the wooden beam would sprout legs and come after them, too. All looked fearfully upwards, towards the direction whence the beam had come. 

In the orchestra pit, the bassist with the mustard-colored headband clung to his instrument, shaking. “It’s him! It’s the Phantom!”

Two sections away, a flutist with flowing silver hair rolled her eyes at him. “Hunk, for goodness’ sake, pull yourself together.” 

But Hunk’s outcry had already spread through the ranks, whispers of “The Phantom!” could be heard in panicked whispers across the stage. Some nodded their heads sagely, exchanging knowing looks with those around them. James looked shaken but quickly gathered himself enough to adopt an outraged expression directed squarely at Iverson. 

“It’s been three months of this, Iverson! When are you going to do something about it?!” 

Iverson, looking very much like he wished to be anywhere but there at that moment, turned to the catwalk. “Sendak, good god man. What is happening up there?”

A curmudgeonly face appeared over the railing, weathered and with a large scar slashed across a now-whitened right eye. “If you please, monsieur,” he sounded out, gruff and disinterested. “There’s no one there. Or if there is, well then… it must have been a ghost.” He finished with a dark smirk. 

The word ‘ghost’ sparked a fresh wave of utterances among the company, until Zarkon stepped forward once again, striking his cane against the floor and achieving instant silence from the crowd. “Opera ghost,” he sneered. “You’re all obsessed. I will say it but once: there is no opera ghost, and no one in this company is to so much as _suggest_ otherwise, especially to the public outside those doors. _Nothing_ is going to get in the way of this production’s success.” Eyes like thin slits swept swiftly across the crowd, “And no _one_.” 

He turned to the director then and, whispering a few hurried commands, strode out as confidently as he had come in, Haggar following close behind. Rehearsals were canceled for the rest of the day, as James was taken to get medically checked out for any unseen injuries. Akira disappeared backstage before anyone noticed, beelining straight for the dressing rooms. He had just made it inside his assigned room and was casting off his wig to reveal a messy head of raven-black hair when he heard a voice from behind call, “Keith!” 

He wheeled about instantly, visibly relaxing his shoulders when he saw Pidge at the door frame. 

“Don’t scare me like that!” He hissed, grabbing her by the shoulders and shepherding her inside as he quickly shut the door. “And don’t call me by my real name in public!”

“There’s no one around; I checked,” she shrugged dismissively while helping herself to a bottle of champagne from the fridge. An appreciative whistle flew out, seemingly unwittingly, as she read the label. “Will never get tired of having famous friends.” 

“Won’t be friends for much longer if you keep pulling stunts like that,” Keith replied, but there was no malice in his naturally husky voice.

“Keithy cat!” A strident voice crowed, and Lance bust through the door.  
  
Keith dragged a palm down his face. “Lord, why do none of my so-called ‘friends’ have any sense of discretion?”

“What are you talking about, man? I am the very _definition_ of the word ‘discrete.’ Why, back in the day they used to call me The Zipper, because once anyone told me a secret, my lips were _sealed_.” 

The looks on Keith and Pidge’s faces said they found this exceedingly hard to believe, but neither said anything, too used to Lance’s usual antics. 

“And? Is Hunk also gonna break down my door at any moment?” Keith said instead, nearly looking to the door as if to confirm his premonition. 

“Nah, he’s heading to dinner with Allura and Coran. Some kind of cultural celebration from their native land to which they markedly did _not_ invite me…” he huffed.

“You’re not even in the orchestra, Lance. It’s probably just a coworker thing,” Pidge offered. 

“We _are_ coworkers! Who would prep the stage or manage the technical effects for each production they play if not you and me?” 

“You know what I mean,” she said with a wave. “Musicians are just like that - no offense Keith.” 

Keith, now washing off his makeup at the sink in the far corner of the room, waved back over his shoulder in a ‘none taken’ gesture.

“You’re just jealous ‘cuz you can’t spend time with Allura,” Pidge continued. 

Reddening, Lance changed the subject. “Anyway, how about that beam eh? Wish I could take the Phantom out for a drink as thanks for his admirable attempts at ridding us of His Royal Nuisance.” 

“That’s not funny, Lance - James could’ve gotten seriously hurt.” 

“But he _didn’t_ , so let bygones be bygones, I say. I wonder how long it’ll be before our new managers learn to play ball with our friendly neighborhood ghost-man?” 

Pidge didn’t respond, but looked over to where Keith had slumped in a chair, now dressed in a soft, oversized t-shirt and tight, thin black leggings. 

“I can’t believe Iverson said... that.” 

Keith shrugged noncommittally, eyes closed, but gave no indication of wanting to continue that conversation. 

“He was right about one thing, though,” Pidge continued. “You _are_ amazing. Is it just me, or has your singing been getting better and better lately? Is it from being back among classical singers, like in your childhood?” 

It was Keith’s turn to redden now, and he opened his eyes only to flick them to the side as he muttered something about having some help. 

“Help?” Lance’s eyes narrowed. “What kind of help?”

“Y’all are going to think I’m nuts.” 

“Try us.”

After a long, searching look in his friends’ eyes, Keith sighed in defeat and leaned back in the armchair. “It all started shortly after I came back here. Boarding here again reminded me of when I was little and I spent all my time in these halls, running and playing while I waited for my parents to finish rehearsing. It brought back a lot of memories.” He fell silent for a moment, but Pidge and Lance simply waited for him. “I started trying to get away whenever I had a free moment, just wandering through the opera house, looking for isolated places to be alone. One late night, while I was sitting in one of the memorial rooms underground, I thought I heard something that sounded like a voice singing. It was very faint, but as I sat and listened, the voice grew stronger, like someone was singing as they walked and they were getting closer. Finally, just when it sounded like the owner of the voice was going to walk in the door, the voice stopped abruptly.” Keith paused, reflecting. “Guys, I’ve done a lot of collaborations and duets with professional singers around the world, but this was absolutely the most beautiful voice I’ve ever heard. Clear as a bell, warm, vibrant… It reminded me of a memory from childhood, someone who mentored me, believed in me when no one else would.”

Lance was clearly trying to contain himself, but finally cracked. “So?? Who was it?” 

“I don’t know,” Keith said simply. 

“What do you _mean_ you don’t know? Who walked through the door??” 

“No one. I never saw the person’s face. The voice just stopped suddenly as if they had seen me and gotten startled. Then I called out, ‘Who are you?’ At first, I thought they weren’t going to answer - there was a long pause. But eventually he spoke.” 

“Wait a minute: ‘ _He’?_ The way you looked while you were talking about the voice just now kinda sounded like you were talking about a gi-” Lance looked towards Pidge. “Oh.”

Pidge stared back, unimpressed. “Seriously? How long have you two been friends now? Isn’t it obvious at a glance that he’s gay as the day is long?” She looked pointedly towards the extremely-tight leggings.

“Ok, _Pidge_. Not all of us have been touring with him for years! I just met the guy a few months ago; give me a break. Anyway, Keith, please continue: Mr. Maybe-Tall, Maybe-Dark, and Definitely-Handsome…?”

But Keith looked like he hadn’t heard any of the preceding conversation, still lost in his memories. As soon as Lance called out to him, he picked back up with his story. 

“I can’t remember what we talked about, just stuff about how I’d been feeling since coming back to the opera house. I told him about my childhood and my parents and the… wow, I told him a lot.” 

Pidge shared a look with Lance. Keith was a good friend and a kind person, but he definitely was not the type to easily share intimate details or open up with anyone outside his closest circle, much less with a mysterious person whom he couldn’t see and had just met. His strict adherence to his performing alter-ego ‘Akira’ was testament to that fact. Besides the two people currently in his dressing room, only Hunk, Allura, and Coran knew Akira’s true identity, in addition to essential personnel, like his managers Kolivan and Thace.

“I guess,” Keith continued, unaware of his friends’ silent exchange, “He just felt really familiar. Like he already knew all about my childhood - like he already knew _me_.”

“Ok Keith,” Lance started up nervously. “Not gonna lie, that’s kinda creepy.” Keith looked up in surprise, like this hadn’t occurred to him. His eyes had a glazed-over look, as if he was mesmerized by the mere memory of the event. “But what does any of this have to do with your singing?”

Keith looked down at his lap, bashful again, and pulled up his legs to sit criss-cross on the large armchair. Curled up like that, he looked far younger than his age, almost meek. 

“Well, I mentioned my insecurity with coming back to the classical stage - it’s been quite a few years, and the critics in this world are way more vicious than I’ve grown used to. And I mentioned how beautiful I thought his voice was,” he said in a low voice. “And… he offered to mentor me, on one condition.”

“Your body,” Lance deadpanned.

“My trust,” Keith countered, frowning. “As long as I’m okay with not ever seeing his face, he’ll continue tutoring me.” 

“But how do you contact him?” Pidge broke her thoughtful silence, pushing up her glasses as she always did when she was processing a particularly interesting bit of new information. 

“He just finds me,” Keith shrugged. “Wherever I am in the Palais.” 

“Uh...huh... And this doesn’t bother you in any way?” she pressed. 

“Uh, no - why should it? He’s a good guy-”

“A good guy who insists on never showing his face and who stalks your every footstep throughout the opera house,” Lance interrupted. 

“It’s not like that-”

“For all we know, he could be a serial killer or a rapist who spies on ballerinas in the women’s locker room-”

“He’s not like that!” Keith exclaimed, clearly growing increasingly agitated. He had risen from his armchair and was now pacing through the room. “He’s kind, and he’s sweet, and he’s-”

“Do you even know his name?” Pidge asked in a quieter tone. 

The room fell silent as Keith looked away for a third time. “When I asked, he said I should give him a name - whatever I wanted to call him.”

“And? What do you call him?”

With a furious blush, Keith bowed his head and glared as if to burn a hole into the ground. 

“Angel.”


	2. Chapter 2

Weeks passed in the blink of an eye and soon it was opening night. Keith stood triumphant, resplendent on the edge of the stage, bedecked in a glittering lilac robe, his costume for the last act. It seemed every eye in the house was fixed on him and the light he put out, a star in every sense of the word. Even Pidge and Lance on the sidelines found themselves standing still and listening instead of attending to their duties. Somewhere from the dark recesses of the opera house, Keith knew, another pair of eyes quietly drank him in. 

These were the moments Keith lived for, when his song swept up both him and his audience and carried them to a higher plane of existence, an astral plane of music and beauty. After enough practice and rehearsal, no conscious effort or thought was needed to perform - his voice simply  _ was _ , and he simply set it free and enjoyed the ride. Tonight was special, though. Tonight, he felt an energy that was not his own, and his body vibrated with it. It felt like he was a conduit, and his voice came from somewhere, or some _ one _ , else. It was almost frightening, teetering on the edge of control. The wild energy that set his heart racing gave the impression that if he relaxed the slightest bit, he would be carried away and lose himself, helpless to an overwhelming power that would take over his mind and consume his very soul. 

And he liked it. 

He felt so high, like nothing could touch him. Like he was made of pure light, and everything his voice washed over would shine and ring in resonance with him. Later, the critics would write that his performance was “feverish” and that the bright and beautiful madman on stage enraptured the audience not with his usual soft, angelic voice, but a voice powerful and terrible in its beauty, like the archangels of scripture, too radiant for mortals to look on. 

Eyes wide, he finished on a long, lingering high note that rang throughout the theater. A beat of stunned silence followed while the rapt audience shook off their hypnosis. Thunderous applause crested over him, as intense in its ferocity as Keith in his performance. He looked out, eyes slightly unfocused, surveying the standing ovation, and everything after that passed in a blur. He remembered bowing with his fellow performers, then alone. He remembered the curtains closing. And suddenly he was being tackled from all directions, his colleagues as excited as the audience. 

“Akira! You were fantastic!” 

“Akira, over here! There’s a line outside waiting for autographs!”

“I think there’s some reporters asking for you in the Avant Foyer, Akira!”

He stumbled along in a daze until he heard familiar voices, and felt a hearty clap on the back. 

“Oh my god Akira, you were  _ phenomenal! _ What the hell was that?” Pidge was already holding out a bottle of champagne and a champagne flute, and pouring out a healthy dose. 

He took it absent-mindedly and looked around. In the distance, he saw Hunk and Allura quickly making their way over, waving animatedly. Dully, he feared for the handle of Allura’s flute case as she put it through the ringer in her vigorous waving. 

“My dude, that was an excellent  _ descarga _ , as Lance would say,” said Hunk, pulling him into a crushing bear hug. 

“I don’t think you’re using that word correctly,” Allura corrected Hunk. She turned a warm look to Keith and smiled at him with pride. 

“That’s definitely what that means. I’m sure of it,” Hunk obstinately argued. “Ke- Akira,” he continued, glancing around them. “You’re hitting up the after-party, right? Pidge rigged up the lightworks, and it is going to be-” 

“Lit?” 

“Oh hi Lance,” Hunk sighed as the young Cuban settled beside them. “That is just terrible. Is one day without your puns too much to ask for?” 

“I’m pretty sure he would die if he couldn’t make his usual puns,” added Allura, but the look she gave Lance was almost fond.

“Sorry guys, I’m feeling kind of tired after that performance. I think that was all I had in me,” Keith finally spoke. Pidge stared at him, expression unreadable. “I think I’m just gonna tuck in. Catch you in the morning for mimosas?” He tried and failed to put on a convincing smile. 

“Yeah sure man, Pink Elephant again?” Hunk was mercifully too distracted while trying to give Lance a noogie to even notice the mangled attempt at cheer.

Keith nodded, already handing his glass to a passing assistant and turning to head back to his rooms at the opera house. His friends watched him trudge away, and if Pidge and Lance shared worried looks, Keith didn’t see it. 

Even years of fame hadn’t gotten Keith used to the energy drain brought on by adoring crowds; he still considered himself an introvert at heart. This night was worse than usual, however. Exhaustion weighed heavy on every limb, and a dull ache pulsed through what felt like every muscle in his body. His usual post-show routine helped somewhat: wig cast off, he made himself a hot cup of chamomile tea and slipped out of costume and into red silk robes that he had received years ago from some head of state that was a huge fan. Lance would tease him endlessly if he knew, but Keith had to grudgingly admit that as girly as it may be, those robes were damn comfy at the end of a long day. Besides, who was Lance to talk? Keith knew for a fact that he slept with a cooling mask to reduce the swelling under his eyes.

He briefly considered removing his makeup, but even that was more effort than he felt capable of putting forth. Instead, he settled for half-heartedly taking off most of it with a wipe and leaving the more in-depth scrubbing for later. Then he stood in inspection before the great wall-length mirror that stood proudly in its gilded frame at the far end of the room - an ancient relic that had been part of the Palais since its construction in 1875. The smudged remnants of eyeliner ever so slightly accentuated his ‘soft violet irises’ - the sole reason, according to his critics, that he had been catapulted to fame, since it certainly couldn’t be attributed to his musical prowess. He scowled.

“Ready for a sexy night on the town, Keith,” he muttered sardonically. 

“Keith…” whispered a soft echo in the room. 

Keith whirled around, unsure if the sound had been in his mind, a natural echo, or…

“Angel?” He ventured timidly. 

A sharp knock on the door drew his attention. Without missing a beat, Coran’s bushy red mop followed through the door shortly after. 

“Perfect show, my boy! You knocked them dead!” He intoned in his usual unflappable cheer. 

“I sure hope not; I need them to keep coming to future performances.” Keith rejoined seriously. 

Unheeding, Coran busied himself arranging the two huge bouquets of flowers he had brought with him in vases on Keith’s dressing table. From inside his jacket pocket, he brought out yet another flower. This one was a lone red rose, around its stem a black silk ribbon tied to a simple diamond ring. The ring’s design was sweet and delicate, a fiery center stone with smaller radiating ones at its edges: a daisy, or perhaps a star. “He’s proud of you,” Coran uttered softly, laying the rose on Keith’s lap. 

Keith inhaled softly. “Are these real diamonds?”

Coran smiled knowingly but didn’t say anything. Instead, he blabbed on about joining Allura and ‘the kids’ at the after-party, and something about Keith enjoying his youth, but Keith was still focused on the rose. 

“Coran, you know his real name, don’t you?” Suddenly, Keith looked serious. “Come on, it’s been months. You know I can keep a secret. You both can trust me.”

Coran just stared, uncomfortable. “It’s not a matter of trust, my boy,” he finally replied with a gentle lilt. “I know- we know you’re trustworthy. Just  _ trust  _ that when he’s finally ready to tell you, he will. It’s not for me to say.” 

Keith bowed his head. “You know how I feel about him,” he whispered in a question-statement, so low that only Coran, who was standing right next to him, could hear. 

The older man’s eyes softened and he ruffled Keith’s hair. “I know.” Then, with a glance around the room that Keith didn’t see with his head still bowed, Coran continued in a louder voice, “Anyway! I should get going now. Plenty of paparazzi in the foyer just dying to catch a glimpse of Coran Coran, The Handsome Man! Take care of those flowers, ‘Akira.’ They’re from adoring fans.” And with a final wave of his fingers, he was gone again. 

Keith gazed a moment more at the rose, then carefully untied the ribbon and emptied one of the vases holding the large bouquet Coran had delivered, placing the single rose within it and the huge bouquet in the trash can. The diamond ring he put on, pausing for a weighty moment with a solemn smile before fully sliding it with purpose onto his left ring finger. It sparkled on his hand like a warm wink from a friendly eye, and he tried hard not to think about how it was already perfectly sized to his finger. A strange coincidence, that was all.

Coran was right. He needed to trust his angel.  _ Patience yields focus, _ he reminded himself. That was what Angel always repeated in their lessons when Keith got too frustrated with fast runs in the high register. And Coran was also right that he would tell Keith when he was ready. For now, he had to stop obsessing over a man he had never even seen in person. Maybe he would go to the after-party, after all. He had just risen to look through his closet for something black and tight to change into when he heard a knock at the door again. 

No one burst through, so he knew it wasn’t anyone he wanted to see. Quickly donning his wig and making his way to the door, he cautiously opened it to a handsome young man with a sharp chin and long blond hair tied back in a slick, low ponytail, holding yet another bouquet of flowers in front of him. The room was starting to look like a flower shop. He was dressed in a slim tailored suit and a cloying smile. 

“Can I help you?” 

“Lotor,” the man with the smile offered, as if that was all that needed to be said. 

“Low to wha- Look, do you want something or what? I’m kind of busy here.” 

“Oh? I don’t see anything that should occupy your time,” Lotor said, craning his neck as he subtly pushed past Keith and let himself inside. “And Lotor is my name - surely you’ve heard of me? No? Zarkon and Haggar’s spawn? Ah, I see that does the trick.” As he spoke, he took out the angel’s rose and replaced it with his own bouquet on Keith’s table. The latter’s eyes flashed but he held himself back at the mention of Zarkon and Haggar. If Lotor had thrown the rose in the trash instead of placing it on the table beside the vase, Keith may very well have punched him. The thought brought a smile to his face, which Lotor misinterpreted when he turned back from his flower-arranging.

“The mention of my parents does tend to have that effect on people,” he added dourly. “I wanted to come by and extend my personal congratulations to the star of the Opera Populaire, on a… stellar performance.”

_ He and Lance would get along, _ thought Keith. In the same flat affect, he finally spoke. “Thanks. Sure is kind of you to trek all the way to the wing of the personal quarters of the performers just to say congratulations to little old me.”

“Oh, it wasn’t too much of a trek,” Lotor ignored Keith’s tone. “You see, I’ll be staying nearby.”

That did get Keith’s attention. _ “What?” _

“I’ll be joining the esteemed Opera Populaire shortly. Nepotism, am I right?” he chuckled. “Worry not; I do have the appropriate level of training and experience to back it up. I might have ended up here, anyway. It was unlikely before today - I find it a bit tacky these days to do a stint in the Garnier - but I’ve recently changed my mind,” he finished, giving Keith an examining look that made him supremely uncomfortable. 

Even though he wasn’t showing any skin, Keith still instinctively pulled his robe tighter around him like a protective shell. Lotor was walking forward now, having not yet broken eye contact. Keith felt suddenly and painfully aware that Lotor stood between him and the door, and that behind him there were only a few inches of space and a table. 

“You really were excellent today,” Lotor said as Keith tried not to make it obvious that he was calculating exit strategies and weighing the pros and cons of laying out with a concussion the only son of his new bosses. “Really, really excellent. A veritable mini-Carlotta Giudicelli... Perhaps I should call you Carlotta? Or maybe... Charlotte. No, I’ve got it: Little Lotte.” Lotor was inches away now and closing the distance, ending up bracketing Keith against the table with his arms. The jostle of a sharp wooden edge against his ass made Keith realize he had been backing away as Lotor neared. Normally, the young star would pray that no one would burst into the room in such a compromising position, but for the first time he found himself hoping one of his lovably tactless friends would make their usual unbidden and trumpeting entrance. He thought he heard the crack of something splintering somewhere nearby and wondered if the sudden weight addition of Lotor and Keith leaning against the dressing table had been too much for the antique piece of furniture. 

Lotor’s eyes were crawling down Keith’s face, to his pale neck, and further, until they landed on the petite diamond on his left hand. 

“What do we have here,” he said, moving his right hand to hold up Keith’s left and examine the ring. The latter suppressed a shiver of revulsion. “Someone has a secret admirer? Or, not so secret,” he added, searching Keith’s eyes. 

Keith looked away as if to hide whatever Lotor thought he could discern there, and took the opportunity of Lotor’s arm no longer trapping him against the table to roll away in what he hoped looked like a graceful and definitely not fearful maneuver. He tried for a flippant tone. “Lots of fans in this field of work. You know how it is.” 

Lotor did not reply, but kept watching Keith’s abrupt change in disposition upon the mention of the ring like he had uncovered a major clue in the murder case he was trying to solve. 

“Indeed. Why don’t you tell me all about it over supper tonight?” 

“I’m busy,” Keith returned before Lotor had finished his sentence. 

“Make time,” the other man said darkly. And, with what sounded like a threat: “My parents will be there, too - they will likely want to gush all over you for a great performance.” 

“Doubtful,” Keith grumbled sotto voce.

“Ten minutes. My carriage will be outside the gate, Little Lotte.” 

When the door closed behind him, Keith nearly sank to his knees. He had no time to despair; he had to get dressed for this. 

“It better not be an actual carriage,” he bit out, removing his wig again to give his scalp a quick rest. Somehow, considering Lotor’s personality, it was a very real concern that he wasn’t just figuratively speaking about his car. Keith groaned and placed his head in his hands.

“Keith…” came the whisper again. The lights flickered.

This time, he was sure he hadn’t imagined it. His head snapped up. 

“Angel. I hear you; I’m listening.” Keith strained his ears, but heard nothing more. The distant sounds of the post-show hustle and bustle around the opera house that normally came bleeding through the vents in the bedroom had by now died down. Cast and crew alike were probably at one after-party or another. Times like these were when the Palais was at its quietest, loneliest. Still in his red robes, Keith made for the door to the hallway, the silk swishing loudly against the deafening silence. 

As usual, there was no one there. The last of the housekeepers must have already left, because even the hallway was draped in darkness. A cool gust rushed from the dark ends of the corridor and its chill washed over him and ran up his spine. He quickly stepped back into his rooms, locking the door. There was no one there. But it still felt like he was being watched. 

Once more, he gathered his courage. “Angel?” he ventured. 

“Insolent boy, this brave young suitor,” echoed through the room at last. 

Keith breathed a sigh of relief. “I knew you were there. Why didn’t you speak up earlier?” 

“I was thinking,” came the pensive reply. The voice was soft, almost unsure. Not at all like the usual warm, honeyed voice Keith was used to hearing through the walls (and in his dreams, if he was honest with himself). 

“I’m sorry,” said Keith, not really knowing what he was apologizing for, but distressed that his angel was upset for some reason. 

“Are you going to supper with him?” the voice asked, still soft. 

“N- no. My soul was weak; forgive me Master. I was afraid that Zarkon and Haggar- but no, no... I know they can’t afford to sack me over a spurned son.”

He must have said the right thing, because he was rewarded with the usual cheerful, low chuckle of his beloved teacher. “Keith, you’re so old-fashioned. Have you always called your mentors ‘Master’? How many times do I have to tell you it’s not necessary?” 

Keith blushed and shrugged with a small pout. “Force of habit. It’s what the old-school fogeys at the conservatory always insisted on. It would feel weird not to do it. Besides, it’s not like I can call you by your name otherwise…” he finished almost inaudibly. 

Clearly, it was not soft enough, because the angel did not speak for a few moments. 

“Do you want to know my true name that badly?” 

The young singer’s eyes widened.  _ God, yes.  _ He wanted it so badly he couldn’t even bother to dissimulate his desire with the expressed wish of respecting the other man’s feelings. Coran’s words were banished from his mind as quickly as they had come. 

“Do you wish to see me?” the angel asked now. 

Keith finally found his voice and whispered a hoarse, “Yes.” 

“Then you will,” the voice said simply. “I will show you why I hide in the shadows. Only you, Keith. You are special. I’ve haunted the halls of the opera house for years now. I see them all, the prima donnas with their haughty pride, the chorus boys in their ravenous competition.” 

As the voice spoke, Keith felt the room gradually grow warm and his sight hazy. He got the peculiar feeling that the rest of the universe was disappearing at the edges of his vision, and the only thing left in existence was the voice of his Angel of Music, Keith’s senses dull to all else but that sound. 

“None of them are true believers, true artists. Like that upstart, Griffin - I’ve seen how he treats you, the way he spreads lies to the others behind your back. They are all false worshippers at the empty altar of Art. But not you, Keith.” 

Keith’s eyes were lidded now, his head pleasantly muggy. He had the distinct impression that he would believe anything the voice said, because the voice was incapable of deceit. 

“Come to me, Keith,” and Keith immediately began walking towards the great gilded mirror at the far end of his room, whence the voice appeared to be coming now. “Look at your face in the mirror. I am there inside.” 

Keith lifted heavy eyes to his reflection in the ancient silver surface, and startled at the image. He looked wrecked. His face was flushed, pupils so dilated that black had almost entirely taken over the dusky violet. His lips were red and shiny, and he realized then that he had been biting down on them for some minutes. His hair was mussed, and one shoulder peeked out from the red silk sliding down his arm. He looked positively indecent. 

“ _ I am there, inside...”  _ In a daze, Keith had the strange thought that he no longer could tell where Angel ended and Keith began. The angel was him. His voice was the angel’s, and Keith a puppet that the audience saw: Akira. Distantly, he heard a knock and a voice behind him, but he could not focus enough to make sense of it. 

“Come to me,” said the voice in the mirror again. The distant knocking grew more insistent, then frantic. “Come to me...” and suddenly when Keith reached out, there  _ was _ no mirror, only air. Keith stepped through the mirror. 

In the morning, Keith was gone.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> For the record, I’m a Raoul girl through-and-through. Shiro’s background was just too perfect to not make him be the Phantom.


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sensitivity notes: I don’t mean to de-legitimize Aces and Aros with my description of Keith’s ‘awakening’ to Shiro; I figure Keith might just be Demi. Or Shiro-sexual, as the actual show all but explicitly states.

Had it been moments or days, Keith mused. His face felt hot and his body lethargic with... want? That was new. In the past, he had often come to wonder if he just had not been meant to experience intimacy with another person, because no one so far had inspired the kinds of feelings he was told he should have felt by now. Apparently that was not the case, he thought through the haze. 

Stepping through the mirror, he took the gloved hand that reached for him without trepidation. This was his angel; there was no need for doubt. Slowly, as if in a fog, he looked up from the black glove to a black-sleeved arm, to a broad, vested chest - Keith’s breath caught in his lungs - and a high collar, to a chiseled chin and deep, longing almond eyes like warm, liquid steel. They held his gaze so resolutely that Keith barely registered the black mask that surrounded them and covered half the angel’s visage. Above the mask, white hair fell in a tousled tuft over the forehead, backlit by the torches lining the walls such that it seemed as if an actual halo framed his beloved angel’s head. 

Keith frowned in confusion. What he could see of the angel’s face looked too young to sport a full head of white hair. More importantly, why was he wearing a mask? How was he here now?  _ Where _ was here?

Torn between the sudden onslaught of questions, what came out of Keith was, “So what’s your name?”

At that, the angel smiled sweetly and it felt like an electric shock to Keith’s whole being. That smile was everything and always would be, he knew intuitively. 

His angel addressed him with overwhelming warmth, “Keith, my real name is... Shiro.”

Shiro looked like he was waiting for Keith to say something, but after a moment of only silent consideration from Keith, he started walking, softly pulling Keith with him. They were making their way through dark, humid tunnels now, Keith still being led gently by the hand. Keith’s mind was spinning. Shiro. Something at the back of his memory tugged at the name but the more he reached for it, the further it got from him. He attributed it to the inexplicable connection he had felt towards Shiro since the first moment he heard his voice - that bond must be making everything of Shiro’s feel familiar to Keith. That must be it. 

He led them down narrow stone staircases, beneath broad load-bearing arches, past doorways that seemed to branch off into more and more corridors, all the while making gentle conversation and seemingly not noticing how Keith marveled fixedly at him as if he were actually the celestial being Keith had nicknamed him. 

Shiro smiled fondly to himself. Keith was the real angel, he thought, softly tugging the red silk back over the exposed left shoulder. This might turn out to be harder than he envisioned.

In surprisingly little time, they found themselves at the edge of the vast underground lake beneath the opera house, where a single black gondola butted against the concrete shore. One look at Keith dazed and swaying on his feet, and Shiro swept him up and into the boat, carefully arranging the flowing folds of the robe around his body. 

“This is so thin, Keith. You’ll catch a cold like this,” Shiro admonished, starting to row.

Keith’s thoughts were indecipherable, his features set in contemplative determination as their little boat made its way over the silent waters. He was still staring at Shiro - his hands, his face, his torso - then reaching out, simply said, “Finally.” The older man raised an eyebrow. Keith’s hand had landed on Shiro’s chest, but he didn’t seem to be aware of it. He was looking into Shiro’s eyes again, expression more serious than it had been, even through the heat clouding his gaze. “Why did you hide from me?” 

Shiro looked away then, thankful they had reached their destination in time to stall for an answer. The destination appeared to be an opulent set of open rooms by the lakeside. Where before they may have served merely as part of the Palais Garnier’s dingy basement, they had been remodeled to resemble a comfortable drawing room. Red velvet and gilded mirrors were everywhere. At the far end sat a grand organ with freshly-scattered sheet music already set out on the stand. An absolutely unnecessary number of tapered candles on standing candelabras everywhere suffused the entire space with a warm, soft, otherworldly glow. Had they not been surrounded by lake water and nonflammable stone, Keith might have had concerns about the obvious fire safety code violations.

In the wake of his awe at the beauty of Shiro’s home, Keith was immediately distracted from further questioning. Shiro, for his part, busied himself tying off the boat, then carrying Keith out princess-style, much to the latter’s chagrin. 

“You looked a little unsteady on your feet,” Shiro explained with a chuckle when he set him back down. Lifting a tentative hand, he placed a cool glove against the younger man’s cheek. “Are you feeling alright?” 

Keith unconsciously pressed into the touch, letting his eyes drift closed. “Yeah,” he replied softly. “Just feeling a little hot. Probably too much excitement for one day.”

“That  _ was  _ a hell of a performance you put on. You did well.” The other glove came to rest against the side of Keith’s heated neck. This one felt even cooler to the touch, more solid somehow, and Keith sighed in relief. 

“I was able to do it because you were with me, Master,” he murmured dizzily, eyes hooded. The hand on his neck seemed to stiffen somewhat, then to carefully move down to his bare chest. He wished it would go everywhere else, too. Somehow, as cool as it felt against his skin, each place it touched only seemed to grow hotter. “Shiro,” he whispered, their faces now so close he could feel the warmth from the larger man’s body feeding his fever. Shiro’s left hand slid up to entwine his fingers in Keith’s hair, and Keith’s hand echoed it, sliding down to reach for the edge of Shiro’s shirt. Even through the thick fabric, he could feel the type of impressive muscle definition that would have soundly confirmed his sexuality, if he had had any doubt left. Keith grinned. He experimentally shifted his leg between two well-toned thighs and received a suppressed moan as a reward. Shiro wanted this, too, right? He was slightly trembling, and beneath Keith’s hand his heart continued to beat faster and faster. Those were probably good signs. Keith’s fingers were just slipping under the black cotton when Shiro hissed suddenly and sprang back. 

“Wh- what’s the matter?” Keith stuttered, eyes fluttering open. “Did I do something wrong?” 

The larger man had shrunk back, one hand in his hair and breathing heavily. “No...” he gasped out, more to himself than to Keith. 

“Shiro, talk to me. What’s going on?” It came out a bit rougher and more demanding than Keith intended; the far-away look in Shiro’s eyes had him worried and he didn’t have the presence of mind to try to filter his tone. 

But Shiro would only shake his head and shrink from Keith’s touch. The more Keith pressed him for answers, the more agitated the older man became, breaths coming in rapid and broken now. His gaze didn’t seem to register Keith’s presence. Keith had to try something different. 

Grabbing one of the plush blankets lying around, he schooled his tone into something that he hoped was soothing. “Shiro, if it’s alright, I’m going to put this blanket on you now, okay?” He received the slightest of nods and took this as a good sign. Blanket on, Shiro let himself be led to one of the chaise longues and sat down. Keith knelt on the floor in front of him and took both his hands in his own, careful not to touch anywhere else. “It’s okay, Shiro. I’m here,” he crooned over and over until the panicked breathing started to slow and Shiro seemed able to focus on him again. When he finally came back to himself, he looked away, reddening. 

Keith said nothing, but averted his eyes from Shiro’s to give him some privacy and continued rubbing soothing circles with his thumb on the back of Shiro’s hands. As he let his gaze wander, he noticed for the first time that night a plastic ring hanging off a thin cord around Shiro’s neck. It was a tiny thing, clearly a child’s toy, with an oversized plastic ‘diamond’ and weathering on the sides that betrayed the number of years it had been worn around its owner’s neck. Keith smiled.

“Affianced, are you?” he grinned, gesturing to the plastic ring. 

Shiro paused for a moment, surprised, then softened into a fond look that Keith was growing only too used to seeing on his face. “I don’t think my ‘fiance’ remembers. We were only children, then.” 

“Tell me about it,” Keith returned with an equally fond smile. 

An odd look passed momentarily through Shiro’s eyes when he met Keith’s, but it was just as soon gone, as he started, “It was back when I was still being classically trained. I was very young, but my parents encouraged my wish to pursue a career in music, and I was fortunate enough that they had the considerable means to help make it happen.” Keith burned with curiosity about what the word ‘still’ meant and what had happened to derail Shiro’s musical career, but he bit back the question and listened on. “There was a young boy I spent all my time with, a little spitfire.” Shiro looked upon Keith fondly, and the latter couldn’t tell if the affection in those steel eyes was aimed at himself or the boy in his memory. “He was... shining. Like a star in the dark night. Brilliant and full of life, always laughing. And in everything he did, he gave his all. Even proposed to me with  _ this  _ after declaring his passionate, undying love.” Shiro giggled then, a sound like silver bells, and Keith wished he could drown in the sound forever. 

“Well,” he continued, “It didn’t exactly sound like a proposal so much as a declaration of war, with the ferocity he put into everything. Gave me his word that he’d marry me when we grew up, even if I was no longer so ‘pretty’ when I became an adult. Portentous words, in retrospect,” he chuckled, darkly this time, and thoughtfully turned the plastic ring over and over in his fingers. “He saved me. I was a bit of a gloomy child, I suppose. Always alone. Dreaming of writing music, but deep down always feeling like I knew I could never be good enough. But he believed in me. My first ever piece was a melody I wrote for him, and when he heard it, he actually  _ cried  _ and said he knew I was going to be a great composer... He believed in me, and then I began to believe in myself.”

“What happened to him?”

The other man’s smile died. “He was taken away shortly after.” And he rose as if to signal the end of that conversation. 

Keith watched in silence as Shiro walked towards a teak-wood bar built against one wall of the sitting area and prepared a particularly large cocktail. 

“And... what happened to you?” He cringed as soon as the words left his lips.  _ Really, Keith? You couldn’t have phrased that a little differently? _

Shiro looked up, then back down at his drink preparations. “Suddenly, a music career just doesn’t seem as important or appealing when you’re forced to watch your only brother waste away slowly and painfully, too young to achieve any of the things that you yourself so easily take for granted. It feels... wrong, that your dreams are so easily coming true while he’s losing  _ his  _ dreams, his everything. Goals change, old fantasies don’t have the sheen they used to, and you find yourself... signing up... for things you never would have thought you’d be capable of doing.” 

“Signing up?” ...Enlisting. Keith’s eyes widened. It all began to make sense. The mask, the total-body covering, the panic attack, the prematurely-whitened hair, the interrupted music career... the muscles, he added mutedly to himself. A deep heartbreak and urge to comfort overtook him. The young man rose and made his way silently to his fallen angel. Red silk robes dragging regally on the fine rugs, he felt like a king stepping forward to receive the divine blessing of Shiro’s touch, and maybe, he prayed, holy communion.

The man in question stood rooted to the spot, frozen like one of the marble statues that dotted the sitting area. He could only watch in- fascination? terror? as the ethereal being of his worship stepped lithely toward him and pressed his burning body directly against Shiro’s own. Keith felt so slender beneath his arms, so delicate. Like he could break him if he wasn’t careful. It was the greatest exercise in restraint to let the watery silk slip through his fingers instead of crumpling it in his fists and tearing it off in one go. Especially when the young man’s tight grasp on Shiro’s hips made his intentions exceedingly clear.

“Keith,” he let out in a strained whisper. “You don’t- I’m not- You deserve the world, Keith. You deserve everything your heart desires.” He forced himself to break away from the raven-haired nymph seemingly hellbent on obliterating his resolve. 

“What I desire...,” Keith began, mouth dry. He licked his lips and continued roughly, eyes trained intensely on Shiro’s. “I want to be of service to you.” What. _What am I saying?_ Keith thought vaguely. That was definitely a weird thing to say, right? Somehow, the right words just wouldn’t come.

The look Shiro gave him now was both puzzled and conflicted. “Wha-” 

“I want to serve you.”  _ Not much better, Keith _ . He frowned, trying to find a way to express the whirling thoughts that refused to settle in his overheated brain. “I want to be your voice, to always be with you.” Jesus, now that sounded like a love confession. Keith was reminded of the story about the little spitfire and the plastic ring. 

Yet Shiro looked... touched? “Since the moment I first heard you sing, I knew I needed you with me; to sing for me, to sing for my music.” He cradled the young man’s face, then slid his hand down in a blistering caress, dropping it before him for Keith to take, then leading him through a nearby curtained archway into an adjoining room, all the while holding Keith’s gaze. The room was dark, soothing on the eyes. The thought of returning to the surface with its glaring lamps seemed abhorrent; all Keith wanted was to melt with Shiro into the darkness of this room, into this bed. Oh, he was on a bed - when had that happened? His thoughts were cloudy again. “Only you, Keith,” Shiro was murmuring, almost humming. Keith wanted desperately to stay awake, to run his hands all over the strong body that was cradling him like he was something precious. “Stay with me,” was the last thing he heard, and the sound of a voice like silver bells singing a familiar lullaby. 

~~~

The opera house was in an uproar. 

No one knew what had become of Akira the last two days, or what to make of the mysterious circumstances of his disappearance: spirited away in the middle of the night, vanished from behind locked doors. With no sign of forced entry, struggle, or previous threats on his life,  _ la PP _ were forced to conclude that the most likely explanation was that Akira himself had chosen to leave. 

Of course, the press for this new scandal only fanned the flames that Akira’s impassioned opening night had sparked. Zarkon and Haggar functioned in a state of perpetual disgruntlement, having been left high and dry by Akira, but the hungry gleam in their eyes betrayed the zeal with which they watched their new production trending higher by the hour on social media.

For the past two nights of Akira’s disappearance, James Griffin had had to step in as understudy during rehearsals and the one live performance that was scheduled to play, much to the managers’ delight as well as his own. He had performed well, if not in the radiant manner Akira had, but it seemed that it would hardly have mattered even if he hadn’t; the mystery of the kidnapped tenor was enough to fill seats with patrons gossipping about the likelihood of James being next on the kidnapper’s list.

Speculation on the opera’s haunting and the motivations of the Phantom in taking Akira - for there was no doubt in the cast’s and crew’s minds that this was the doing of none else but the Phantom - increased as well. It was all Zarkon and Haggar could do to suppress the rumors by tasking Sendak the chief stagehand with prowling through the ranks and keeping such conversations in check. Unbeknownst to them, Sendak was also the chief instigator of said conversations, loving nothing more than to scare the young female ballet dancers with horror stories about the opera ghost’s ghastly appearance and Sendak’s brushes with death in the ghost’s presence.

“This is bullshit!” Lance paced around Keith’s empty dressing room, nervously chewing on a jerky stick. “How can the police think a beloved international idol just up and wandered away in the middle of the show of his life, like he went out for a pack of smokes and lost track of the time?” 

Allura stood and put a hand on his shoulder. “Calm down. It’s not like they’ve given up the investigation. They just don’t have anything else they can do here for the time being and have to explore other avenues. Besides, it’s only been two days. I’m sure Keith is alright - isn’t that right, Hunk?” 

Hunk’s distraught face, however, was far from providing the reassurance that Allura was trying to elicit. 

“We’ll just have to take matters into our own hands,” Allura finished with authority. “Pidge, what do you have for us? I know if anyone can outshine the  _ police nationale _ , it’s you.”

Pidge sat in Keith’s comfy armchair, brows knit together and bent over her laptop. At Allura’s words, however, she looked up and scoffed. “Outshine? They’re not even playing on the same stage. Their security has more holes than the victim of a Russian firing squad-”

“Jesus christ, Pidge,” muttered Lance. “Have some class...”

“ _ You’re  _ one to talk. Anyway, their internal comms say the same thing they’ve been telling us: no suspicion of foul play, and they’re running out of leads. Nothing was upturned, no signs of struggle or forced entry. It’s like he just... vanished into thin air.” She fell silent. 

“There’s something else, though, isn’t there?” observed Hunk, watching her expression flicker with uncertainty. 

“Just trying to look for a loose thread. Keith disappeared from inside his room, and no one heard or saw anything except Lotor, who thought he heard two voices when he went to fetch Keith to go to dinner...” 

The other three nodded to show they were following. 

“But no one else was in the room by the time Lotor was able to find someone who could unlock the doors from the outside. The last person besides Lotor who saw Keith could have been the speaker-,” 

“We should talk to Coran!” Lance concluded. 

Allura shook her head. “He’s with Kolivan and Thace right now. They’re trying to call in some old army buddies or something to start search efforts of their own and Coran’s trying to talk them down before they get arrested for interfering with an official police investigation.” 

Pidge interjected in a louder voice, “ _ Obviously _ , I already talked to Coran; it was the first thing I did when I broke int- accidentally overheard the police officers talk about who had last had contact with Keith. The speaker wasn’t him. He said he was in and out very quickly and that Keith seemed perfectly normal and they talked about perfectly normal things.”

“‘Perfectly normal things’? What the hell does that mean?” said Lance.

“Who knows? It’s Coran. My point is, the missing speaker is the loose thread we’re looking for.” 

“Well sure but besides us, Coran, and his managers, there’s no one else Keith would even talk to, you know how antisocial he- what? What did I say?” Hunk looked between Pidge and Lance, who looked at each other with determined and wide eyes, respectively. 

“You don’t think-?” 

“It would certainly fit all the clues,” Pidge frowned grimly at Lance. “I fucking knew it. I told him-!”

“O-kay, someone wanna fill in me and Allura?” interrupted Hunk, raising a hand. 

“Keith has a stalker.”

“What!”

Lance took in an exaggerated breath and rushed out, “Keith’s been talking to someone through the walls of the opera house and this someone’s been following him everywhere he goes and it’s obviously super creepy except Keith refuses to admit it because for some reason he’s freaking obsessed with the guy -it’s like he’s hypnotized or something-”

Allura demurely held up a single finger. “And it didn’t occur to you that this was relevant to the case at hand?” 

But Pidge was already out the door, running towards the wing that housed the performers’ quarters. 

~~~

When Keith awoke, everything was still dark. The only light he could see was the golden incandescence that shone through the sheer black curtains separating the bedroom from the drawing rooms. His whole body felt heavy as he sat up with effort and blinked blearily at his surroundings. The bed he was lying on was incredibly soft, maybe even softer than the memory foam he had had moved into his quarters at the Palais - the one luxury he insisted on. 

He tried to remember how he’d gotten there, but the last thing he remembered was Shiro tucking him into bed... Shiro! Keith jolted out of bed and threw open the curtains. 

Shiro in profile embodied the very picture of domestic felicity, humming  _ La donna è mobile _ while cooking bacon in a ridiculous frilly apron too small for his bulging pecs. Keith couldn’t help but giggle and at the sound, Shiro turned, white forelock falling over his eyes and almost glowing in the light. He really did look like an angel just then, breaking into a besotted little smile on seeing Keith in the doorway. 

“Good morning! How are you feeling?”

“Sore,” said Keith, rubbing feeling back into his arms and experimentally rolling one shoulder to warm up his muscles. “How long was I out?”

“A full day. You must have already been running a fever when you took the stage,” said the other, holding up a still-gloved hand to Keith’s forehead. “You should rest some more.”

“Pfft. I’ve already slept for an eternity; more sleep is the last thing I need. Besides, I’m starving,” he nodded towards the bacon with interest. 

“In that case, I have bacon and eggs, blueberry pancakes, orange slices, and waffles with raspberry compote - I wasn’t sure what you liked to eat for breakfast,” Shiro finished sheepishly. 

Keith gaped. What a ridiculous, wonderful man. “Just how much do you think I can eat?”

“Eat however much you like! I just wanted you to have a selection ready when you woke up.” 

“As long as you have coffee, I’m good with whatever else,” Keith laughed and shook his head as he stole a piece of bacon from the pan on the stove (promptly burning his fingers).

The ‘kitchen’ was a cozy area on a lower level to the side of the main drawing rooms. It was hard to believe that anyone could make a cavernous subterranean basement by the side of a creepy, misty, indoor lake look cozy, but somehow Shiro had managed it. Everything was clean and neat. Redwood drawers, a marble island countertop, and sunshine-yellow gingham curtains hiding the kitchenware in a teak cabinet. It felt distinctly ‘Shiro.’ 

And said man was currently cooking a mountain of bacon just to make sure Keith had as much to eat as his heart desired. Affection surged in the younger man, who quickly cleared his throat and pushed the thought away. Shiro had resumed his cheerful humming, and Keith waited for the climax of the refrain before bursting in bombastically and with an impressive vocal flourish. 

“Muta d’acceeeeeentoooo...” He’d probably regret going all in this early in the morning and without warming up, but Keith couldn’t bring himself to care at the moment.

Shiro turned in delighted surprise, only to be swept up by Keith into a dance hold. He sang expertly and waltzed Shiro through the kitchen, the latter giggling and joining in at the top of the refrain. 

“La donna è mobile, qual piuma al vento...” they sang as they spun around the room, feeling soft and airy and full of light. The bacon sat forgotten on the lit stove, and when it started to smoke is when they finally stopped twirling to yank it off and collapse on the ground, breathless from laughter. 

“Your Italian’s not bad; you know the song well,” said Shiro, still breathing heavy from the exertion of singing and dancing before breakfast. 

The other scoffed with an affronted look, “I  _ am _ a professional opera singer, you know! Of course I have to know Verdi’s entire works!” 

Shiro shot him a fond, knowing smile. “So you finally feel comfortable calling yourself an opera singer?” 

The words made Keith’s expression snap back to neutral like a rubber band. Being with Shiro, being tutored by Shiro, and the feeling of home that came with it, had momentarily dispelled the feeling of being an outsider that had haunted him since he had returned to the Palais Garnier. In a more reserved voice than before, he responded, “Well, I was taught all this a very long time ago... I just remember my training, that’s all.” 

Without another word, Shiro scooped him up onto his feet and whirled him into a kitchen stool by the counter. Flourishing a spatula that he produced from within the folds of his preposterously frilly apron, then a can of whipped cream, he started singing  _ Brindisi _ from  _ La Traviata  _ and clowned decorating the pancake stack in front of Keith with increasingly complex creamy ornamentations while Keith battled his hands with a fork and tried to eat around his antics. 

He soon had the young man laughing again, and full to boot. Their breakfast duel had at some point turned increasingly competitive, and in the adrenaline of the moment, Keith instantaneously planned and executed a feint. 

Looking back, he supposed he might have done it partly because the more warmth and affection he felt for this lovely human, the more curious he became about what lay beneath the ever-present mask he wore. Why did Shiro have to keep wearing that thing? He no longer needed to hide from Keith. Keith would love him no matter what, and surely Shiro knew that now - he just had to. The young singer made as if to playfully stab Shiro in the abdomen with his fork, but immediately shot his other hand upwards and dashed off Shiro’s mask in a single swipe. 

It didn’t even register that a loud gasp had escaped his lips unwittingly until he saw Shiro’s heart break in those beautiful stormy eyes, and then he wasn’t seeing Shiro’s face at all because the angel had instantly turned away and was bending to pick up his mask. 

It was too late; Keith had seen. 

Right underneath the swirling gray of his eyes was a giant jagged scar, deep and mangled, angry and red as if it had been only weeks old - though it must have been years at this point since he’d had it. It stretched clear across his face, from eye to eye, crossing the bridge of his perfect nose. 

Keith was panicking. He wanted to explain to Shiro that the gasp wasn’t directed at his looks. God knows it wasn’t. Shiro was gorgeous. He could have been a model, no- a Greek god descended from Olympus itself. The scar somehow only accented his devastatingly good looks further, like an exclamation point on the world’s most beautiful poem. Keith desperately wanted to say that he had only gasped at the physical evidence of the immense pain Shiro must have gone through in his past, that Keith loved him, that even if he  _ had  _ been horribly disfigured, Keith would stay with him for all eternity if he would have him. 

But as usual for Keith, he froze and found he couldn’t say the words that most needed to be said. Memories flashed through his mind of countless hours spent before his kindly childhood therapist, unable to make himself give voice to what he was feeling. Instead now, he watched in mounting anxiety, waiting for the possibility of another panic attack. What had he done. Shiro was traumatized by whatever had happened to him, by the memories it had left on his body, and Keith had known it - had seen it for himself only a day earlier when he helped him down from that episode. And yet his idiot self had selfishly, cruelly torn away the one piece of security this beautiful man had left: the simple strip of black cloth that allowed him to hide from the ugliness the world could aim at him, ugliness like Keith. 

Keith’s eyes swam and his vision blurred, but still he said nothing, and Shiro merely walked off, shrunk in on himself as if he would disappear into thin air. He walked slowly, and yet to Keith in that dreadful moment it seemed as if Shiro vanished before he could call out or stop him. The angel stepped through one of the many doorways of his quarters by the lake, pausing only to push against a stone in a pillar that depressed like a button before he was swallowed up by the darkness.

No longer seeing his figure finally released Keith from his paralysis and he immediately ran to the doorway to catch up with Shiro, but he was gone. The doorway led to an impossibly empty alcove. He looked back around the drawing area but Shiro was nowhere to be seen. Then he turned his eyes to the dark entrance of a corridor that had opened up when Shiro pressed that stone. Unlike the ones they had used before, this one did not branch into endless fractal passages; in the soft glow of the candelabras behind him, he could just make out a straight path that climbed up towards a singular destination.

The tears were definitely falling now; he could feel cold wetness splash against his collarbone. He had messed everything up. He had messed everything up and Shiro wanted him to leave. Heart heavy and numb, Keith stepped into the corridor and into the nothingness that wound and climbed and led back to the outside world. 


	4. Chapter 4

Something was wrong with Keith. Ever since Orpheus had returned from the Underworld, as Lance so aptly put it, he hadn’t been the same.  _ Underworld? They don’t know how accurate that is _ , Keith had thought dully. He hadn’t told them much of anything about what had happened or where he had gone, merely that he had been safe and well taken care of. When Pidge asked if he had been taken by the Phantom, Keith had gone quiet and ended the conversation. There was definitely something wrong, his friends agreed. 

Just a few days ago, Pidge had raced through the halls followed closely by the rest of the gang, with Lance continuing to fill in Hunk and Allura on the details of Keith’s supernatural mentor as they jogged. She practically busted down the doors to Keith’s room (before Hunk helpfully pointed out that they had been unlocked since the police investigation), only to find Keith casually sitting on his vanity stool, with a haunted look in his eyes but easy as anything and looking like he had been back for at least a day lounging in his room, if the food wrappers strewn on the floor were anything to go by. 

After quickly checking him all over for any sign of injury, she had then proceeded to practically throttle him for disappearing and then having the gall to return and not run straight to his worried friends to let them know he was back. Thankfully, Hunk was able to hold her back and stop her from finishing the job. Keith said nothing, barely acknowledging their presence. That had worried his friends anew, and they had insisted on taking him to the hospital and a therapist to make sure he wasn’t in shock from some terrible invisible trauma. 

It had all been useless when it came to Keith, of course. He was tight-lipped about anything regarding his angel, the Phantom, or even whether he thought they were one and the same. Pidge, and by extension the gang, was convinced, however. Two mysterious entities haunting one opera house was simply too many to be a coincidence. Which meant that Keith’s ‘angel’ was also the same phantom that had tried his hand at attempted murder. 

That was the only thing that would get a rise out of Keith these days. At all other times he was listless and despondent, but at the merest hint of someone slandering Shiro he defended him viciously until he was red in the face and breathless. 

“Keith,  _ please _ . The man  _ kidnapped  _ you and held you captive for two days. You have to admit he’s a monster,” Lance would plead.

And Keith would spit, “You have no idea what you’re talking about! You don’t know what he’s like!” 

Realizing they were succeeding only in agitating Keith further, they quickly stopped trying to argue the point, though from then on they only referred to ‘the angel’ as ‘the Phantom’ in conversation. Keith would frown, but remain silent. 

He was silent a lot these days. From the start, ‘Akira’ had never been a very talkative celebrity. His allure was of the distant, cool-beauty variety, an ideal that everyone could fawn over but that remained untouchable to all. Even so, his silence now was noticeable. As soon as he had returned, his overly-cautious managers had insisted on him taking a short leave of absence from the production for health reasons, which turned out to be a very good idea, as Keith started spending an inordinate amount of time skulking about the opera house’s lower halls, crying inconsolably and calling out to some unseen person and receiving no response. After the first few times Pidge caught him doing it, she mobilized their friends into a sort of bouncer/escort guard to arrange it so that no one came near the tunnels while Keith was there. 

When it became obvious that Shiro either could not hear him or would not answer, Keith turned to Coran. The poor man could only pat Keith’s shoulder sadly and tell him that he also had not seen Shiro for days. Eyes rimmed red, Keith begged that if he did get into contact with him, to please tell Shiro he needed to see him no matter what. 

A week had passed by then, and it was time for Keith to return to the stage. The story fed to the press had been that Akira had been forced to take an urgent leave of absence due to a family emergency, which had been poorly communicated to the proper authorities. Mystery ‘solved,’ all had returned to its usual calm in the opera house, or so it seemed to the outside world. Hunk, Lance, Pidge, and Allura watched sadly over their friend as he moved like an empty husk from rehearsal to rehearsal and gala to gala. Akira’s previously-established aloof persona and his relentless professionalism were enough to mostly mask that anything was wrong during his public appearances and performances, but the change in demeanor had not escaped the hawk-like eyes of Zarkon and Haggar, nor those of their son, who had begun to dog Keith’s footsteps like a vulture circling its eventual prey. 

Keith was so tired. He felt continually exhausted, no matter how much he slept at night, and in addition to that he now had to deal with Lotor’s unrelenting attention. He would try to catch ‘Akira’ after rehearsal, in the corridor, in his room. At social functions, he would follow him about the room under the guise of escorting him, all the while ignoring Keith’s flagging attempts at keeping him away. 

This, too, concerned Pidge. As well as the fact that her surveillance had alerted her to Zarkon and Haggar’s intentions to take advantage of Keith’s distracted state and push for James to take over the lead role. While Keith pined away in the basements of the opera house, the duo courted James’ favor: moving him to a larger dressing room (right across from Keith’s own), bowing to his every caprice, presenting him to the opera’s most influential patrons while Lotor chased a haggard Akira around the very same ballroom. It was all going according to plan. Having successfully milked Akira’s international fanbase and the drama of his disappearance, Haggar now moved to supplant the mouthy streetrat with a proper leading man, one who had come up within the proud, closely-guarded ranks of classical opera. 

Pidge had to do something. Keith himself was certainly going to be of no help; when she informed him of her discovery he had merely shrugged and continued fiddling - as he had taken to doing of late - with the small diamond ring on his left finger, saying, “We’ll still get paid whether I sing lead or not, so don’t worry about your job security.” 

“It’s not  _ my _ job I’m worried about!” she grit her teeth. “Don’t you know by now I could be making bank in Silicon Valley or the Pentagon or CERN if I felt like it? It’s  _ your _ career I’m thinking of here. The great Akira can’t be demoted mid-production! Not to mention the fact that you can sing and act circles around that damn Ken doll.” But Keith had already checked out of the conversation again.

She had had little luck with Lance and Hunk, too. Lance had immediately launched into a million wild and useless ideas, all variations on sabotage of some kind towards Zarkon, Haggar, James, and even Lotor (just because he was trying to get his grimy hands in their friend’s pants). Hunk, for his part, had nodded along earnestly and pledged his undying support to whatever plan Pidge came up with. Clearly, she was on her own for this.

The three were gathered now around the breakfast table (also the dinner table) in Hunk and Lance’s tiny apartment, moodily taste-testing Hunk’s latest batch of peanut-butter and cinnamon-yogurt cookies. 

“These have  _ no  _ business being as good as they are. Peanut butter and yogurt? Hunk my friend, you are either a madman or a culinary  _ genius _ , and I’ve yet to figure out which it is,” Lance was mumbling through a full mouth, and consequently spraying cookie crumbs all over the table. 

A knock at the door had him making a mad dash for the nearby milk to try and force the food down before Hunk let the visitor inside. Seconds later, Allura glided in with her usual poise and impeccable fashion, to the sight of a bug-eyed Lance’s inflated cheeks, a bit of crumb-laden milk dribbling down his chin from the open seam of his too-full mouth.

Pidge made no effort to hide her tears of laughter as she banged on the table, cackling uproariously. 

“Ever the charmer, Lance,” Allura snickered. “Sorry I’m late, everyone. Coran and I were having a little heart-to-heart between father-figure and adopted-daughter.” With gritted teeth, she tossed her shawl on the couch and rifled through the cabinets for the pink and blue lion mug that was exclusively for her use in their apartment. The whole group had gotten matching mugs during a drunken excursion to an outdoor fair earlier in the summer, all lion-shaped but each a different color. (“Team Voltron,” Lance had proudly pronounced them. “What the hell is a ‘Voltron’?” Keith had replied.)

Hunk, frowning, poured her tea and pulled up a stool for her. “Is everything okay?” 

She shot him a sweet smile. “Thanks but everything’s fine. I simply found out that our dear Coran has not been as forthcoming with everything as we thought.” 

Pidge raised one eyebrow as Allura shot her a meaningful look.  _ I guess a little girl-talk is in order later,  _ thought Pidge. 

Allura hastily moved the conversation to Hunk’s love life (which set him off on a series of blushes, stammers, and denials) while making flirtatious innuendo at Lance (which promptly flustered  _ him  _ past the point of remembering his name, much less Allura’s earlier cryptic words). Pidge was impressed. A complete memory wipe in 10 seconds flat. Allura was certainly as powerful an ally to have on your corner as she was a dangerous enemy to cross. 

Later in the evening, she caught her in the balcony while the boys were setting up their new game console. “So what’s the news?”

Gone was the flirty, light-hearted smile as Allura turned to say, “It’s about Keith.”

Pidge snapped to attention. 

“...And about all the stuff you told us about Zarkon and Haggar’s plans. I was bringing Coran up to date, on that and on Keith’s condition, and he started fidgeting the way he does when he has something to hide and is about to try very hard to act normal.”

In the dark of the night, a flash of teeth gleamed. “And I’m guessing you extracted from him what that something was.”

“It’s the Phantom. Coran knows more than he’s letting on.”

“Coran? _ Coran _ does?”

“Yes,” Allura nodded pensively, tapping one delicate finger to her lips as she looked askance over the twinkling lights of the city. “I don’t know how they met, and I don’t know what relationship he has with the Phantom, but he knows more than he’s told us - I’m sure of it. Pidge,” she suddenly grabbed the smaller woman by the shoulders, a determined glint in her eyes. “Zarkon and Haggar are out for the career of a certain deluded music student, said student is clearly depressed, and there’s a lurking presence in the Palais that is a danger to everyone: it all comes down to the Phantom. We need to find him.” 

Ginger hair fluffs bobbed gently as Pidge gave a single determined nod and pushed up her glasses. “Up for an adults-only mission?”

The other spared a single, indulging look towards the sliding doors to the apartment. “They mean well, but they really are useless dolts, aren’t they?” she said fondly.

Pidge giggled. “I don’t know about ‘useless.’ Hunk can  _ cook _ .” 

With long-suffering smiles, they walked back in to a chorus of brags over the speedy setup of the new system, then swift silence when it failed to boot. (“Here’s your problem. Didn’t it tell you to plug this in firs-... Did you two even open the manual?” “Well, no...”)

~~~

Working together, Allura and Pidge combed the opera house for the hidden entrances and passageways that they reasoned the phantom must be using - corroborated by Coran, with help from his favorite bourbon.

“Assuming, of course, he isn’t just walking through walls,” Allura joked. 

Pidge rolled her eyes. 

The first target was of course Keith’s bedroom, which Pidge broke into with -suspiciously- almost  _ practiced  _ ease. After a quick examination made easier by the sparse decoration (just a bed, a wardrobe, a makeup table, and some old mirror), they were forced to conclude that Keith must have simply left his room through the usual means that fateful opening night. The practice rooms were next to be examined, then the memorial rooms underground where Keith had first heard the mysterious voice. Each search proved fruitless. More than once Pidge found herself wishing her engineer-nerd of a brother was in town to join their investigation.

The two women finally made a breakthrough towards the tail end of the production’s run. Just in time too, thought Pidge. If  _ she _ were planning a dastardly blow to an artist’s career, the perfect transition would be between shows. Zarkon and Haggar surely had something up their sleeve for the upcoming production, and Pidge had to be there to stop them. 

The fated meeting happened during the first sit-down for the performers who would be starring in the new show. Allura had pointed out that despite the radio silence from the Phantom, his proven affinity for Keith surely had him still following the young tenor throughout the Palais. As luck would have it, the one hidden panel they had been able to locate was in one of the large reading rooms where smaller rehearsals and meetings took place. 

Through her usual means, Pidge arranged for this to be the room used for the initial briefing. They then had merely to lie in wait behind the paneling and watch over the proceedings they were certain would lure their preternatural target straight to them. 

Pidge, as the smaller of the two, was chosen to be the one to hide and deliver the message, provided she could hold herself back from attacking the Phantom before she could do so. She made no promises. Every minute spent crouching in the dark, dusty, damp space worsened her mood, and the only thing that kept her determined not to take her anger out on the Phantom as soon as he showed his slimy, kidnapping, creeper face was Keith’s tired, heartbroken face on the other side of the wall. A series of creatively-angled slats, seemingly decorative from the within-room side, allowed Pidge and wandering Phantoms alike a perfect view -and audio- of the room’s proceedings. 

Just who had built this opera house, and what kinds of intentions had they had for there to be so many in-built surveillance spaces, she questioned inwardly. And couldn’t they have added at least a convenient bench if they were already going to go this far.

“Welcome, everyone!” sounded a familiar, high-strung voice from the other side. 

Pidge peered through the slats to see the fiery red head of Coran moving across the room. 

“Normally the director would be running this show -pun intended- but his wife’s gone into labor so I volunteered to step in for this initial briefing. As an aside, I’m delivering the giant card you see on the back table to the hospital later, so if you’d like to add your greetings and well-wishes to Madame Ulaz, be sure to sign the card before you leave. Alright!” he clapped his hands for emphasis. “As you all know, the production we’ll be putting on is indeed  _ Lohengrin _ , however, it is not the  _ Lohengrin _ you auditioned with.” There was a pause that, knowing Coran as she did, Pidge guessed was for dramatic effect. “We’re very sorry about the secrecy but there’s a good reason for it.  _ This _ Lohengrin is something very modern by an up-and-coming visionary composer. A bit of a mix between Wagner’s version and the classic tale of Cupid and Psyche - a romantic, whirlwind story of a lost love and a brave young woman’s epic journey to win him back! Akira, you will be playing the brave young woman.”

“What.” Keith, or rather  _ Akira _ at the moment, was perched on a stool leaning back against the far wall, legs and arms crossed, platinum hair in a messy bun, face pale and haggard and utterly unamused. “I thought I auditioned for the role of Lohengrin.”

“You did audition for the ‘lead role,’ of course. However, despite the eponymous title, Lohengrin is not actually the protagonist of this story. I’ll explain in a moment...” he blathered on. Coran went on to identify the casting of the rest of the characters, glaringly omitting the name of the person who would be playing the Swan Knight until the door to the room opened again to a pair of stylish black knee-highs. 

“Ah, and here is our Lohengrin now. Thank you for finally joining us.” 

“How can one call oneself a diva without being fashionably late?” Lotor drawled out, waving one hand in the air with approximately 150% more flair than was strictly necessary. Clearly, most of the performers in the room had not yet met him, because men and women both were hungrily giving him ocular pat-downs, gazes lingering on pants so tight they left little, if anything, to the imagination. Pidge supposed she could concede he was objectively attractive - if one was willing to stoop to dating the personality equivalent of a detritivore. “I was just finishing up moving the last of my things into my quarters. Do go on; don’t let me interrupt,” he finished with a slick grin.

“Ahem. Yes, well, as I was saying, this is an epic romance with elements that many of you will be familiar with. As in the Wagnerian opus, Lohengrin the supernatural knight arrives to rescue the damsel in distress Elsa, played by Akira” -Keith frowned- “on a boat drawn by a flock of swans. Oh come now, don’t give me that look, Akira. I told you, it’s a very modern production. The name is only to keep something of the original - Elsa’s character is written for a leggero tenor such as yourself, no falsetto required. So, as to what happens next: dashing action ensues wherein Lohengrin rescues the duchy and marries Elsa, swearing eternal love on the condition that she never ask his true name.” A hurt expression dashed across Keith’s face for an instant, but he schooled his features back to neutrality so fast that Pidge wondered if she had seen correctly. “They are blissfully happy together, until of course the curiosity gets to be too much and Elsa unmasks his true identity, due to which Lohengrin is forced to flee and Elsa loses her true love.” Pidge was now staring intently at Keith, who was by the second looking more and more like he had bitten down on something sour and was trying desperately to hide it. “Torn apart by her grief, Elsa attempts to retrieve him and embarks on a journey, constantly calling to her true love to come back to her, and suffering through a series of trials that lends itself to an excellent aria for you, Aki- what, where did Akira go? Did anyone see him leave?”

Keith had rushed out silently moments before, light glinting off the corners of his eyes. Pidge’s heart clenched and she moved to follow after him when she suddenly spied movement some feet away from the darkness of her hiding spot. 

“Wait!” she whispered as she scrambled to move towards the shadowy figure. “It’s important.” 

She couldn’t see who it was, but there could be little room for doubt as to who else would be sneaking behind hidden panels and spying on her best friend. To his credit, he had stood stock-still once she said it was important. Out of respect for this gesture of good faith, she stopped far enough away that she couldn’t make out any features beyond the dark hood he wore. 

“It’s about Keith. Please, you have to listen to me.” 

The figure inclined its head, and Pidge sighed in relief. He was going to give her time to explain herself, but she didn’t know how long and there was a lot to cover. 

Taking a second to gather her thoughts into as concise a message as she could make it, she took a deep breath and let out as quickly as she could, “Zarkon and Haggar are planning something against Keith. I don’t know if it has anything to do with Lotor’s continued attempts to get with him, but I know for a fact that his parents are looking to ruin Keith’s career and set up James in his place, possibly by next production. Also,” she paused, wavering with uncertainty before nodding slightly to herself and continuing in a softer voice, “Keith is  _ not  _ doing well. Please, if you could just... talk to him, just once. He... he really needs you.” Pidge wasn’t sure if she had actually emphasized the ‘you’ or if it had been only in her head, but loathe as she was to admit it, it had become painfully clear that his friends’ support was not enough for Keith right now. The man standing before her was the only one who could give Keith what he needed.

The figure before her stood still a moment more, seemingly waiting to see if she had more to tell him, but when she remained quiet he gave a deliberate, slow nod to indicate he understood, and was off the next instant before Pidge had a chance to see in which direction he had gone. 

Shaking herself off, she headed back towards the staircase she and Allura had found that led to this hidden area, all the while reflecting on the impression that the Phantom had not seemed as surprised about Zarkon and Haggar’s plans as he had at the thought that Keith actually wanted to see him. Regardless, whether or not he already knew of the managers’ machinations, she knew she would rest easier tonight knowing for certain that he was apprised of the situation. If there was one thing she could give to the possibly-murderous, probably-disfigured, definitely-creepy Phantom, it was that he would do anything for Keith.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Some phrases I use here are ones that often come up in cases of abusive relationships. In my story, the friends that are warning Keith actually are mistaken about what’s actually happening, but please don’t take this as encouragement that if you’re told these phrases about a relationship you’re in, that they’re likely wrong. In many actual abusive relationships, the victim may not pay attention to their friends when they say this because they think the friends don’t “know the real him/her” etc. This is part of the manipulation that happens in an abusive relationship. If someone - especially a trusted friend - comes to you to voice a concern that you may be in an abusive relationship, please do take it seriously and consider whether they may be right. You deserve to feel safe and happy and be respected and loved.


	5. Chapter 5

It had now been three weeks since Keith had last seen Shiro. Or more precisely, 20 days and 5 hours, give or take 20 min. He still couldn’t sleep well and he didn’t have much of an appetite, but Keith was fine with that. He accepted that this was his punishment for trampling on the heart of the most beautiful human being on the planet. And now the punishment was ramping up. How else to explain the cruel twist of fate that had him acting out on a world-famous stage the most painful loss he’d experienced since childhood? This was just what he deserved, and he was going to grit his teeth and sing his heart out for it, goddamn it.

With the previous production wrapping up and rehearsals starting for the new show, Keith had found himself conveniently busy. He hardly had time to eat and sleep (not that he was doing much of either anyway), much less dwell on the way the cinder remains of what used to be his heart continued to blow away into oblivion. The physical exhaustion was a nice reprieve from the existential torment.

What was not a nice reprieve was working with Lotor. Where before Keith had merely had to see him at social functions and the odd occasion where he couldn’t dodge fast enough to avoid running into him in the halls of the opera house, he now was having to endure his lecherous looks and unwelcome advances practically 24/7. During rehearsal, he was there. During breaks, he was making conversation. During mealtimes, he was wheedling the cast to go out to eat together and Akira was forced to go lest he be labeled a poor team-member. There was simply no escaping him, and trying to do so was quickly proving to be more tiring than the hectic work schedule.

Keith could feel his resolve wearing away with each passing day. He simply had no more energy left to keep up the non-stop verbal sparring that had hitherto defined his relationship with the greasy bastard. It was easier to just say yes when Lotor invited him to be his date to the work gala to promote the new production, or the annual charity ball the company hosted. It wasn’t as if he could say no, anyway, with the threat of Zarkon and Haggar constantly hanging above his head. Might as well just skip the insults and jabs at Lotor’s pick-up lines or ostentatious but under-performing car (thankfully not an actual carriage, as it turned out) and skip straight to the inevitable conclusion. Keith had to conserve his energy for the stage. 

Besides, for now Lotor seemed content to extort these chaste middle-school dates out of Akira, possibly because he knew that if he tried anything more Akira’s fist would kindly help Lotor perfect his falsetto. 

No, the only real concern Keith had was tackling the greatest challenge of his acting career: namely, pretending to care for Lotor’s character the way he actually did for Shiro. Because Lohengrin’s character was so much like Shiro it hurt. Kind, selfless, dashing, even the supernatural way in which he had first appeared to Elsa and the white hair that matched Lohengrin’s swan-motif stage costume reminded Keith of him. And of course, the way in which Elsa’s damned selfish curiosity had driven the holy knight away reminded Keith of himself. The casting was excruciatingly apt in his case, he thought with a wry smile. 

“What have we here? The Amazing Akira, sulking in the corner like a drowned rat,” a pompous voice pulled Keith from his thoughts. He turned where he sat, curled up on a seat by one of the recessed windows of the Galerie du Glacier.

“Jimmykins. Been seeing a lot of you lately, for some reason... You know, as understudy you only have to join me in rehearsal, not follow me around during downtime as well. Or, were you looking to get some pointers on how to avoid constantly going flat on that C5?” Keith shot back with a cocky grin. 

James’ smug look fell flat. “You know what your problem is, Akira? You think you’re untouchable. You think you’re on this high cloud, a god among men, and of course you think that, because men and women everywhere are constantly drooling over you, kissing your ass and drinking champagne from your Louboutin combat boots-”

“Ok, I’mma stop you right there, these aren’t  _ combat boots _ -”

James wasn’t listening. “-but every beloved icon comes crashing down to earth sooner or later, and I can’t wait to see the look on your face when all your precious fans behold their fallen angel and realize they no longer give two shits about a used-up would-be opera hack that doesn’t know his place is in the streets or a mosh pit, not the arts.”

Perhaps if this had been some weeks ago, Keith would have shrugged it off with a wisecracking retort. Perhaps if he had still had Shiro in his corner, believing in him and propping him up with his gentle support, he would have told James to fuck off and suck a big fat dick. But Shiro wasn’t with him anymore. Keith was alone. And now, standing here before James with all his insecurities being shouted back at him in sharp, explicit detail, Keith  _ felt _ alone. More alone than he’d ever been. So he just rolled one shoulder and turned back to the window, eyes distant and unseeing. “Did you need something, or did you just come here to insult me?” he monotoned, empty of emotion.

Even James seemed taken aback by this sudden change. He took one startled step towards the door, and then couldn’t flee the scene fast enough, the look on his face that awkward expression one gets when coming across a stranger crying in public. 

Silly of James, honestly. Keith wouldn’t cry. Crying took energy, and it took caring about things more than Keith felt remotely capable of at the moment. 

His phone started beeping the 15-minute warning to the start of rehearsal, so he dragged himself away from the window and headed to the stage. They were almost ready to run dress rehearsals. Maybe the costumes would help Keith pretend that he wasn’t surrounded by the very people he most disliked. Step by step, his ‘combat boots,’ as James had called them, carried him slowly back to him, back to Lotor, and back to the gilded cage of the Palais’ gleaming proscenium arch. 

~~~

As they approached the eve of  _ Lohengrin _ ’s opening, Akira was frequently seen by cast and crew pacing nervously around the opera house. When he had a break from rehearsals, he would take to random corners backstage, shooting furtive glances at passersby. Today, he was joined in his dark corner of choice by everyone’s favorite (by which they would say they meant “most tolerated”) stagehand. 

“Dude, would you chill with the leg-shaking and the foot-tapping? You’re freaking everyone out!” said the tawny man. He was currently executing the world’s slowest rope-spool so as to be able to claim he was technically doing work.

“Sorry, Lance. Just been having a hard time relaxing lately.”

Lance’s wide eyes told Keith he had sounded just as uncharacteristically polite and genuine as he suspected he had, but he had bigger concerns than the customary ribaldry in which he and Lance almost exclusively communicated. 

“What’s up, buddy? Something got you down? I mean, other than the whole-” He mimed a ghost floating through the air. “-that’s been continually getting you down for the past month.” 

Keith gave a small uncertain frown. “I... don’t know. Maybe it’s all in my head. I keep thinking I see someone out of the corner of my eye, but when I turn no one’s there. Or I hear a sound like a shuffle, but then it stops when I turn around. It feels... like someone’s following me.”

“Finally,  _ Virgen santísima!” _ Lance exclaimed, throwing up both hands and eyes in an expression of gratitude to the heavens. A few of the other stagehands looked their way at the yell. “Like your bosom mates have been trying to tell you for weeks, someone  _ is _ following you, Akira. Has been since you got here. And frankly, it’s about time you realized how creepy-”

“No. It’s not him.” His tone left no room for doubt. “I don’t know how to explain it but... it feels different with him. Warm, safe. I’d be able to tell if it was him.”

His friend observed him like Keith had confessed to having a sixth sense, and maybe he had, Keith thought. “Umm. Okay. So what - or who - is it, then?”

He shook his head. “For the last time, I don’t know. Oh, that was a rhetorical question. Regardless of who it is, it seems like it’s been happening more by the day.”

Lance straightened up and looked towards the distance with intense concentration. “I see. Do you think it has anything to do with opening night?”

“Huh? Why would it?” 

“Oh, nothing. Just spitballin’, you know me. Anyway, be careful dude. I’ll keep an eye out for anything suspicious. Uh, gotta go talk to Pidge about something real quick - catch you on the flipside!” 

Keith watched Lance rush away with one brow raised. Who the hell had used ‘catch you on the flipside’ since the... 90s? 80s? And why the terrible rush to talk to Pidge?  _ I thought he was gone on Allura.  _ Maybe he had been checked out of his friends’ lives for longer than he had realized. He would pay more attention from now on.

From the direction of the auditorium, beyond several layers of thick side and mid-stage curtains, came the almost muffled sound of the orchestra tuning their instruments back up. It would soon be time for Ulaz to call him back to the stage to rehearse the next scene. With a sigh, Keith heaved himself up and started walking towards one of the dark, enclosed nooks the stage crew sometimes used as storage, to grab the Gatorade bottle by his duffel bag. He had that familiar feeling again, like an ominous tickle on the back of his neck. It was just in his head, he reminded himself. The stagehands had all left to set up the next rig and there was not a single body around but himself. He didn’t stop walking, but did turn around to check behind him once more. No one there. Turning again to face forwards, he almost ran into a wall of flesh. 

“S- Sendak! I didn’t see you there.” 

“Akira. Ulaz sent me to fetch you for the next scene.” 

“He sent  _ you _ ? Uh, not that there’s anything wrong with that, it’s just he’s never-”

But Sendak appeared unperturbed and simply continued in the same tone. “Were you looking for this?” He held out Keith’s Gatorade bottle with a smile. Except, no, it wasn’t Keith’s Gatorade bottle. 

“Oh... thanks? I could have sworn I’d gotten the red one this morning.” This bottle’s liquid was decidedly electric blue. 

Sendak’s smile slipped just a fraction, little enough that Keith didn’t notice. “Is that so? It must have been another of the bottles they leave out for the performers. Oh well, blue is the better flavor anyway.” 

Keith forced a polite laugh. “No way, Team Red for life.” He hoped he sounded more natural than he felt. This whole exchange felt deeply unsettling for some reason. Maybe it was because the muffled orchestra still playing in the background was just starting the most sinister-sounding passage in the entire score. Maybe it was because of the way Sendak gave the impression that he wasn’t blinking at all. The singer stepped to the side to continue on, but Sendak pressed the bottle to his chest, blocking any further movement with an arm like a titanium car-gate barrier. 

“What’s the big deal? It’s just a drink flavor. Hurry up and take it, Ulaz and everyone else are waiting for you.” 

Something was definitely up. Keith subtly widened his stance and dropped his weight like he had been taught. An international icon needed to know martial arts, Kolivan and Thace had said - presciently, as it turned out. Turning slightly to face Sendak, he made his tone light. “Oh you know us divas. Have to have things  _ just so _ , like Lotor always says.” 

His opponent didn’t laugh. In fact, he appeared to have dropped the pretense entirely, by the way his body stiffened into attention. With speed that Keith would not have expected from the brick house that was his body, he lunged at the smaller man with a growl. Had it not been for Keith’s earlier preparation to move, he probably would have been tackled. As it was, the smaller man managed to pivot at the last second and dodge Sendak’s bulk, which barreled past him with uncontrolled momentum before crashing to the floor. 

Sendak scrambled to his feet and wheeled back around to face Keith, baring his teeth and eyes full of rage. 

“Not used to failing with that move, eh?” Keith taunted.  _ Keep them off-kilter _ , he heard Thace’s voice in his head.  _ You will likely be smaller than your opponent. Use their size against them. Keep them distracted and off-balance _ .

Strategy number one was always to outrun them, but Keith was now in a corner, so that was out. Strategy number two was to fight dirty with any tools around, but there was nothing nearby, not even the rope Lance had been handling earlier, since he had taken it with him when he’d left. 

_ Strategy number three it is, then _ . Keith feinted up with his right, causing Sendak to bring his arms up to block the hit, then pulled it at the last second and brought his knee up as hard as he could. It felt solid. What the hell? Was he wearing a cup? Who wore a cup expecting a fi-?

Sendak dealt a backhand that sent the smaller man flying and set his ears ringing - or maybe that was the far-off flute section. His cheek burned. That would be a bitch to fix in make-up, assuming he made it out of here alive. He registered the lumbering mass coming at him just in time to roll out of the way of what would have been Sendak’s shoe through his skull, then pulled up with both arms on the other ankle.  _ It worked!  _ he noted with surprise. The blundering oaf lost his balance and started to topple.

Wasting no time, Keith met Sendak’s falling head with another upward knee.  _ Damn. Should’ve used the other one. _ The knee was still smarting from the botched crotch-blow, and it made Keith stagger back after making contact with Sendak’s face. At least Sendak looked a little dazed now. It might be enough to give him a window to escape. 

Keith whirled around to run, but had barely made it two steps with his aching knee before he was grappled from behind and fell to the ground, scratching and clawing at the meaty hands holding him down. It was useless, though. The stagehand soon had him immobilized with one giant shin on Keith’s chest, another pinning his left arm, and an iron grip pinning his right arm.

Somehow, Sendak had the blue Gatorade in his right hand once more. He really wanted him to drink it. Keith tried to turn his head, but Sendak slid the shin pinning his chest up just enough to come up beneath Keith’s chin, tipping his head back. 

_ Usually I insist on at least two dates before allowing this kind of thing, _ is what he wanted to say. But he was pretty sure the second he opened his mouth to wisecrack or cry for help, he’d be getting a big gulp of whatever was in that blue liquid. That is, if he didn’t asphyxiate first. The pressure on his chest and against his neck was making it difficult to breathe, much less continue fighting the man trying to force a drink down his throat. Pressure built up in his neck, behind his eyes. His ears filled with the dull roar of his rushing blood and, below it, the distant orchestra whipping a frenzied melody that climbed ever higher, together with his erratic pulse. Everyone was out there, on the stage, just beyond his reach. He would die here, in this moment, and they would not know, could not imagine what was happening just behind the thick velvet curtains of the ancient theater. 

His vision was already getting dark at the edges when suddenly he felt all the weight evaporate. Sendak’s wide eyes were staring straight at him- no,  _ through _ him, and his monstrous figure was getting smaller and smaller, getting pulled up and further away from Keith. The singer stared in horror as his assailant’s huge body jerked violently, suspended in the air by a noose hanging from somewhere above the catwalk. 

Keith couldn’t remember if he tried to look at the point whence the rope hung, but if he did, he didn’t remember seeing anything but darkness. That’s what he would tell the police and his friends later when they asked. Friends who were running towards him now, freezing when they saw the already-still body hanging from the catwalk. Somewhere, a woman screamed, people ran, and orders were yelled. His friends looked up to the catwalk, but by then there was no one there.

Allura was the first to recover from the shock of seeing the corpse and to rush to Keith’s side, checking for any bleeding first and asking if he could move his extremities. Still somewhat out of it, he obeyed and moved each limb in turn. 

“What are y’all doing here?” he began hoarsely, “How did you know to...”

“As soon as Lance told me what you said, I rushed to find you,” replied Pidge before Allura could answer.

Pidge was doing something at his side. Ah, she was examining the blue Gatorade bottle that lay spilled on its side, contents smelling vaguely of chlorine. “Be right back,” and she ran off, reappearing some minutes later with a small glass vial and a dropper with which she collected a sample from the remaining liquid in the Gatorade bottle. Pocketing it, she turned back to her friends and nodded. “Ok,  _ now _ call the police.” 

~~~

“The Hangman Incident,” as the papers called it, sparked a fresh wave of panic in the company, and of interest in theater goers. The Phantom featured in every conversation. He was there in every look the chorus members shot nervously upwards accompanied by phrases like, “Dangerous times” and “You never know.” Few were privy to the details of what had happened between Akira and the victim, and even fewer to the details of why. 

“It wasn’t poison, per se,” Pidge spoke quietly to the intimate group as they gathered in Keith’s personal quarters. “Let’s just say you likely wouldn’t have died, but your vocal cords would have been permanently shot.”

Keith frowned a bit deeper. All things considered, his friends thought, he was taking everything remarkably well. “Sabotage, then.” His pale neck was still sporting a dark bruise from Sendak’s knee, and his left cheek a lingering purple from Sendak’s killer backhand.

“But why would Sendak-?” began Lance.

“Not Sendak. Whom do we know who want Keith’s career out of commission? From whom were we just recently expecting a move?” Allura leveled a look at him. 

“Ah, right, his... bosses.”

“I didn’t think they would resort to such extremes, though,” said Pidge darkly. “I expected something more along the lines of professional sabotage. Press scandals, contract manipulation, that sort of thing. I never thought...”

“Yeah. It’s a good thing the Phantom was there.”

“What?? Hunk, no!” Lance cried out. “Yeah sure  _ this time _ he saved Keith. But might I remind you he also  _ straight up killed a man in cold blood? _ He’s. A. Killer! He’s dangerous! What, do you think he was only able to save Keith because he just so happened to be in the neighborhood? He probably was only there in the first place because he’s still stalking our boy.” 

“Heh.” Everyone turned sharply toward Keith, who was trying to hide the smallest of grins. In answer to the group’s puzzled looks he gave a sheepish smile. “It’s just... following me around, saving me, my ‘angel’ turned out to be more of a  _ guardian _ angel than I imagined.”

Lance, like the others, looked unamused. “Your ‘guardian angel’ turned out to be a lot more murderous and stabby than any of  _ us _ imagined.” 

“Well, technically he didn’t  _ stab _ anyone-”

“Lance is right,” Allura shot at Keith with a no-nonsense expression. “This man is dangerous. I realize you’re grateful to him, but honestly you should be horrified. You just witnessed a man hang to death and you should rest and take some time to process it, and what this means about the man you-” she stopped herself. “L- like I said, you need rest. Come on everyone, it’s getting late anyway.”

Keith dutifully went to bed, but sleep wouldn’t come, even long after the team left his room. What Allura said bothered him, though not for the reasons they imagined. 

He had seen a man die. A horrible, violent death, even. Yet he didn’t feel ‘horrified,’ as Allura had put it.  _ That  _ was what bothered him. It wasn’t as if he felt any pleasure or joy at Sendak’s passing, much less the manner of it. It was a terrible thing, and even now he wished it could have happened differently. But he wasn’t about to spare a tear for the man who, at the time of death, had been mere moments earlier trying to kill him, or at the very least maim him. No, it was what it was, and he accepted Sendak’s death with a calm heart. Maybe that made him a monster. It definitely didn’t make Shiro a monster, however. Shiro was just trying to save him; Keith knew that with certainty. 

He turned on his side. Lance’s words still echoed in his head:  _ “He’s a killer. He’s dangerous.” _ Maybe Lance had a point. Could Shiro have done something different? Regardless of the reason, he had still killed a man without hesitation. No, Keith had to believe in Shiro. Shiro was a good person, Keith chanted to himself, even if that fact became harder and harder to remember the longer he spent without seeing or talking to Shiro. It had been almost a month and a half at this point. 

He eventually fell into a fitful sleep, and dreamt of a pale-haired avenging angel choking him.


	6. Chapter 6

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Warning for attempted rape (stopped early on).

In all the months of knowing her, Allura had never seen Pidge tremble, whether in fear or anxiety. Excitement, maybe: that one time she went Cyber Monday-shopping for a new graphics card. This was definitely not excitement. 

“Calm down, Pidge. Why don’t you take a sip of tea and start at the beginning?” she soothed. 

In the middle of the night, Pidge had abruptly shown up at Allura’s apartment, shaking like a leaf. Allura had immediately brought her inside and put on the kettle. Now, they sat side by side on Allura’s sofa, both waiting for Pidge to calm down enough to get a single word out. With a suppressed yawn, Allura pulled the sides of her gauzy rose nightgown closer about her to keep out the chill of the midnight air. She had the feeling she would not be getting back to sleep any time soon, but if it was what her friend needed, then Allura would push through any exhaustion. Traipsing through the opera house with Pidge every day for weeks, sharing with each other their deepest fears and wishes as they explored every dark corner of the ancient structure, had brought them closer together than anyone in their group except maybe Keith and Pidge. So it was no surprise to Allura that Pidge had come to her, since on this one subject she could never go to Keith.

“There is no beginning. It’s not a story. It’s a fact you already know. Allura,” Pidge’s head shot up, wildly locking eyes with Allura’s own crystal blues. “We killed Sendak!” The smaller woman set down the tea and stood up, tears in her eyes. 

Allura placed one elegant hand on her shoulder and gently encouraged her back down onto the sofa with an understanding squeeze. “Pidge, we did _not_ kill Sendak. _You_ did not kill Sendak. One, you couldn’t have known that those... people would resort to such violence, which is likely what spurred the Phantom to respond in kind. Two, you did not ask the Phantom to take care of things in such a manner-”

“Didn’t I? I knew his methods; I knew who he was-!” 

“No... despite what we told Keith - which I stand behind, because I’m worried about his devotion to that man - I don’t think that’s quite right. I don’t get the feeling the Phantom is a _murderer_ , but rather someone _capable_ of murder. Which still makes him dangerous, too dangerous for our Keith...” she devolved into contemplative mumbles. Pidge sniffed and Allura was yanked out of her reverie. “I am happy to draw a logic flow chart for you if it would convince you once and for all.”

“Ha. I thought _I_ was supposed to be the logical one on the team,” Pidge grinned through tear-streaked cheeks.

“I let you believe it,” Allura winked. Then her features softened into a gentle smile and she reached out a hand to place on Pidge’s smaller, trembling one. “We all need a grounding force every now and then. You saw something awful; we all did. Go easy on yourself.” 

Pidge blinked furiously and dove into Allura’s warm embrace. “I’m not used to going easy on anyone, let alone myself.” 

“With the exception of Keith?” 

“I’m the _strictest_ with him.” Pidge went soft in Allura’s arms as the latter tentatively but tenderly ran her slender fingers through the unruly auburn locks that Pidge always neglected to keep in check. “He’s always been like a big brother to me... maybe more like a little brother, actually. I feel like I have to take care of him.” Then, with steely resolve she leaned back in her seat. “We need to keep Keith away from the Phantom.”

Allura fell once more into thoughtful silence. “I get the feeling he’s coming around to that idea.”

Keith had been much less talkative on the subject of the Phantom lately. He still defended Shiro if anyone outright insulted him, but the bite of it was gone when he could not deny that his angel had actually killed someone. So he kept quiet more often than not, mood mirroring the swiftly-advancing winter.

In a bid to help distract him, Hunk, Lance, Allura, and Pidge continually “encouraged” (pestered) him to go out and socialize, preferably at the same time. Keith’s two least favorite things, he continually reminded them to no avail. As the friends saw it, it would at the very least be a distraction from everything Phantom-related. At the hopeful most, Keith might get a date out of it or, god forbid, a relationship with someone who didn’t moonlight as a near-magical entity. 

Smiling sardonically, he mused that in a way he was -involuntarily- following his friends’ advice, with all the time he was spending out on the town with Lotor. Keith continued to accompany him to various events, sometimes forgetting the reason why he had started automatically saying yes to begin with. It had been a long time since Lotor last explicitly threatened him with Zarkon and Haggar. The actual statement was unnecessary anyway; the implicit threat was there. Post-Sendak, it was more intimidating than ever.

Lotor didn’t treat Keith badly during their outings. Rather, he seemed these days to be legitimately trying to cheer Keith up, which counted for something, Keith supposed. Lotor didn’t mention Sendak nor his parents, and Keith started to wonder how much he did or did not know about his parents’ plan. Meanwhile, his amorous efforts increased. He would bring a bouquet to Keith’s room after every performance (which occurred several times a week, so Keith’s room was in a significantly more floral state than he ever imagined it would be). He hovered possessively around Keith during water breaks in rehearsal. Things had progressed such that even their fellow performers speculated, and the tabloids followed soon thereafter. 

The other half of the pair in question couldn’t be bothered about the issue. The tabloids had never much concerned him; they would say what they would, regardless of Akira’s input, and any further thought into the matter was a waste of energy, as far as he was concerned. It was a strategy that had served well to boost Akira to stardom in an industry where thin skin could destroy one’s career _and_ self-esteem. For the most part, he disregarded Lotor, as well as anyone who asked about their relationship status, against Kolivan and Thace’s best counsel. 

He was much more concerned with the ever-approaching opening night for _Lohengrin_. Neither Keith nor Pidge deluded themselves that Zarkon and Haggar would be deterred by Sendak’s failure, and the closer the production inched towards opening night, the more shrank their window of time to replace Keith. Every day he waited for the shoe to drop, for him to be jumped in an alley or attacked from behind. 

Nothing of the sort happened. Instead, Zarkon and Haggar’s next move turned out to be surprisingly inert. 

“They’re _firing_ me?” Keith spun around in his vanity stool, platinum wig still in hand, having just been about to adjust it over his wig cap. Pidge looked up from the computer on her lap at the sound, but Keith didn’t look angry or scared. He looked incredulous. Bemused, almost. “ _Me_ , Akira?”

“Well, no, they’re _planning_ to fire you, according to the documents hidden in their extremely well-protected desktop.” She rolled her eyes. “And it’s not a ‘firing’ so much as a clever little legalese maneuver that moves your contract outside of the Opera Populaire.”

Keith had already spun back to face the mirror and was almost finished securing the wig with practiced fingers. He scoffed at his reflection, eyes focused on his hairline. “Good luck to them. That thing’s ironclad. I think Kolivan had another of his army buddies draw it up.”

“Not... a lawyer?” she scrunched her face.

“Oh no, she’s a lawyer alright. For Top 10 entertainment companies. The thing’s ironclad.”

“This is serious, Keith; we need to do something. We only have a few days before opening night, and now this document shows up? They’re about to make their move!”

She must have finally sounded sufficiently worried, because Keith walked over to her and hugged her tightly to his chest. “We _are_ doing something. We’re letting the professionals do their job.” He pulled them apart for a moment to ruffle her hair and met her glare with a brotherly smile. “It’ll be alright, Katie.”

Pidge huffed and pulled him back in to bury her face in his chest. He heard a muffled, “It better,” and laughed.

As it turned out, Keith was proved right in record time. Hardly a day passed but Pidge was again bursting through Keith’s dressing room door. He didn’t flinch. Years of living life on the road with her, in all manner of hotel rooms and locales, had long ago beaten him into accepting that this was simply the way Pidge opened doors (and unfortunately his new friends had learned this from her).

“You know, this _is_ my dressing room. I could be _naked_.” He widened his eyes dramatically to contrast with his completely unaffected expression. 

“Been there; seen that,” she waved him away. “The paper’s gone.”

“What paper? What are you talking about? Why are you here so early in the morning before I’ve had my first two cups of coffee?” he counted off on his fingers.

“The answer to all three is, the paper we were just talking about yesterday! The... relocation. Since we only have a few days ‘til opening night, I bugged the room so-”

“You _bugged_ the room??” Keith interrupted.

“Keith, ok? Please? Later. I needed more granular data to keep a closer eye on ‘them’ and stay updated. And when I looked again through their stuff, the paper was gone! But you’ll never believe this next part.” She threw herself onto the big plush armchair and crossed her legs, but didn’t give him time to respond before she was off again: “Another paper was there. One instructing in no uncertain terms that Akira was to play the leading role in _Lohengrin_ or else Zarkon and Haggar risked losing a huge chunk of funding for the company.”

“W- what? Who was it from?” 

Pidge pushed up her glasses, letting the lamps’ glare obscure her eyes while she lowered her face in a devilish grin. “None other than the mysterious benefactor the Dastardly Duo are always bragging about: ‘Raoul.’”

“ _What?_ Pidge, who else did you tell about the papers you found yesterday?” 

“No one but you, I swear. And unlike my victims, _I_ don’t leave paper trails, electronic or otherwise. So it’s weird, right?! I have no idea how this ‘Raoul’ found out about this so fast. I guess maybe they might have directly discussed it with him, since he’s a financial backer? Or he _also_ bugged their room,” she cackled. 

Keith didn’t laugh. 

“Oh come on,” she said. “I know he didn’t because my own bugs would’ve caught it. The only way he could have known about this is if he was a literal fly in the wall.” 

“You mean, ‘fly _on_ the wall.’”

“Yeah, that’s what I said, weirdo.”

Meanwhile, a very different conversation was occurring in the managers’ office. Zarkon towered, bent over the desk and hands braced on it, glaring at the letter as if by sheer force of will he could make it spontaneously burst into flames. Haggar stood by his side, straight as a rod and as calm as always, though frowning deeper than usual. 

“My lord, does it not seem... coincidental?”

“You speak of the timing.” It was a question. 

“That is another matter to consider, for another time. I refer now to the observation that it seems Akira has... many friends. Twice now he has been saved, now by a man he presumably should not know...?”

Zarkon lifted his gaze and met hers in understanding. “I think it is time we became closer acquainted with our mysterious benefactor.” 

~~~

Opening night for _Lohengrin_ was not the electrifying spectacle that Akira delivered for his previous opening night. He was nevertheless enchanting, ethereal, and glowing as always, a perfect match for Lotor’s dashing Lohengrin. It had been a most bitter pill to swallow, for Keith to grudgingly admit that despite his numerous character flaws, Lotor could at least sing decently. 

It was a full house before which Akira took his bow tonight - had been, ever since the Hangman Incident. Keith looked on the macabre tastes of his audience with no small degree of disgust. To hell with Gluck and Handel, a murder was what made them swarm the Napoleonic halls of the Palais. 

Tonight, there would be no escaping the after-parties. His friends had been insufferable in their suffocating need to comfort him. Keith wasn’t that kind of guy. He didn’t _need_ comfort; he needed _Shiro._ Shiro, who had killed a man. Keith shook the thought away, refused to admit even to himself that the thought of Shiro filled him with more than warmth and joy - there was fear mixed in now, too. 

He wanted Shiro. But he shouldn’t be with Shiro. No! There was nothing wrong with Shiro. But was there something wrong with _him_ ? After all, Shiro had left. Shiro had wanted _Keith_ to leave. Shiro didn’t want Keith. Keith should move on. This same chain of thoughts had been looping through his mind without rest for weeks, and Keith was exhausted. 

He closed his eyes and let his head fall back against the wall, shutting out the shrieks and hum of the party crowd around him. Any moment now, Lotor would be coming by- ah, there. He felt a hand on his arm. 

Without opening his eyes, he tiredly greeted his inescapable shadow. “What do you want now?”

Lotor’s supercilious drawl started up as if on cue. “Kitten, always so short with me. What have I done to deserve such treatment? Especially when I come bearing gifts.”

That had Keith opening his eyes. Lotor stood before him, holding out a whiskey tumbler.

“More alcohol? No thanks; your gifts suck, as usual.”

He tutted. “That isn’t the gift. The glass is for you to hold while I give you your gift so it doesn’t look like you’re leaving the party.” He held out his arm for Keith to take, then led them past a group of coworkers forming a dance circle. In the distance, Keith could see Hunk and Lance chanting for Pidge to shotgun her beer. Lotor pulled them out of the party rooms and up the minor spiral staircase nearby, jimmying a locked door to access the Palais roof, which was blessedly empty of people. “I thought you might welcome an excuse to get away from the throngs.”

For once, Lotor had actually understood Keith, not that the latter would ever say it to his face. That shiny blond head was already perilously close to detaching and disappearing into the stratosphere, as large and full of hot air as it was. Regardless, something of Keith’s gratitude must have shown on his face, because Lotor’s expression went suddenly serious. 

“Akira,” he breathed. “Let me stay with you. You’ve been surrounded by darkness, experienced so many terrible things lately. Let me be your freedom.” 

The shift in tone had Keith suddenly realizing for the first time where Lotor had brought them. The Palais roof was indeed empty of people. It was also isolated, picturesque, and possibly the most romantic location in the whole opera house. Around them were the glass domes of the skylights to rooms below, looking like frosted greenhouses. To the right, great stone angel statues towered, watching over them with approving gazes. The chill December air which had initially felt like a relief after cooking in the steamy air of the party raging below them, now seemed suddenly far too much and Keith shivered. Once again, Lotor was between him and the exit. How did Keith keep letting himself fall into these situations?

“Akira,” said Lotor again, “Won’t you at least consider me seriously?” His eyes seemed earnest.

Was it possible that Lotor was serious in his intentions? Had been this whole time? Keith shook himself out of it. _Impossible_. Lotor, however, interpreted the shaking as more shivering and removed his jacket to place it around Keith’s shoulders. Eyes wide and fingers clutched tight on the jacket around him, the young man fought an internal war against the possibility that Lotor, the arrogant bastard whose guts he’d hated since the man first invited himself into Keith’s bedroom, was not as terrible a person as he thought. 

Lotor shifted his weight closer, pausing for a moment then continuing when Keith didn’t immediately move away. It was impossible, but Keith was tired. So tired. What was he fighting against, anyway? What did it matter? It wasn’t as if there was anything anymore between Shiro and him. Shiro was gone and Keith no longer had anything left to care about.

 _Whatever,_ he thought as Lotor leaned in, eyelids heavy and trained on Keith’s lips. His face was only inches away. Keith started to close his eyes. Then he heard it. 

“Akira,” whispered Lotor. “Akira...”

 _“Keith..._ “

His eyes flew open in an instant. It had been so long since he had last heard that voice - tones of silver and gold, the voice of an angel. Was it in his head? A memory? It had sounded like an echoing whisper. Perhaps his brain had finally caved under the pressure and was supplying auditory hallucinations of what he most longed to hear in the world. 

Whether real or imagined, with the sound came rushing a sea of images: Shiro laughing in the candlelight; Shiro dancing and singing; Shiro cross-eyed looking at a dollop of whipped cream on his nose; Shiro holding him with a fond look; Shiro’s heartbroken eyes those last few moments together, desperately clutching onto his discarded mask for dear life, as if with it Keith had delivered his death sentence. Keith’s eyes watered.

“No,” he whispered. 

Lotor froze in the air, centimeters from Keith’s teary face. “‘No?’” He pulled back, but before Keith could apologize or prepare to gently let him down, his face snapped into a contorted, condescending grin. “Ever the frigid bitch to the end, eh sweetheart?”

“W- what?” Keith stuttered out wetly. His cheeks were still wet from the barrage of memories of Shiro, voice thick with emotion and now disorientation. 

Lotor sighed, long and dramatic. “Guess the jig is up. Not worth keeping up the act for someone who’s clearly never going to put out. I thought I put some of my best work into that last bit, too - was it not convincing enough?”

“You... unbelievable son of a bitch. To think, I was about to feel bad about rejecting you.”

“Yes, yes.” He dismissed Keith’s words with a frivolous wave. “I was curious to see how far I could get this way first.”

“Get... what? What are you talking about?”

“Just an assignment I’ve been given, and I wasn’t too busy so I figured why not. Nothing personal, babe.” He started advancing towards Keith again, but with a more purposeful air this time. 

“You mean, since the beginning...?”

Lotor stopped short, surprise in his eyes. “‘Since the beginning’? Oh no, I was only ever mildly interested in fucking you. Your hissy nature just made the game a bit more engaging than it is with my usual targets so I kept it going. This assignment is a new thing. Inspired by... current events.”

Keith was backing away slowly, sizing Lotor up for any obvious weaknesses. His long hair would be a liability. Keith could work with that. “You’re talking about Sendak, aren’t you. Mommy and Daddy put you to work since they failed to either maim me or fire me?”

His opponent remained unfazed. Even chuckled. “That’s exactly right. You’ve been quite a thorn in their side, little Kitty Cat. I hope you don’t actually have claws...” he pulled off the scarf he had been wearing and started on his shirt buttons, then his belt buckle. 

“Ah, so that’s the plan this time?” 

“Sure is. No hard feelings, eh?” was the last thing Lotor uttered before launching himself at Keith. His horrible hands wandered everywhere, groping through any and every article of clothing Keith was wearing. Keith kicked, punched, and bit where he could but Lotor barely reacted to the pain. He tore Keith’s shirt in two and started tugging at his pants. Keith screamed out for help in frustration.

Almost simultaneously, he saw a flash of black from the corner of his eye and then Lotor was on the ground, screaming and writhing under a shadowy mass. 

“Shiro!” 

The shadow turned, and Keith’s heart soared as he finally saw for the first time in six pining weeks those gunmetal eyes like warm pools of liquid steel. With Shiro distracted, Lotor managed to escape his grasp and scramble to his feet. Shiro turned back to him and _growled_. He lunged, fist snapping through the air with such force that Lotor was unconscious before he hit the ground. 

A moment passed where Shiro seemed to waver on whether or not to check on Lotor’s head for any bleeding, but he appeared to decide against it when he saw Keith half-naked on the ground, shivering against the freezing wind and on the verge of tears once more. Shiro was on him in a second, cradling him to his chest and wrapping the slight frame against Shiro’s body beneath his long black coat. 

“Shh, it’s okay. He’s not going to hurt you anymore,” he crooned, wiping away Keith’s tears with a gentle thumb. 

A wet laugh escaped Keith. “Are you kidding me? That guy’s a pissant. That’s not why I’m crying, Shiro. I’m crying because I’m so happy to see you again. I missed you so much.” He buried his face in Shiro’s neck, and thus missed the truly hilarious span of emotions that crossed the larger man’s face. 

“What?” 

Keith pulled away. Shiro looked like he had not the slightest clue what to do with this information. As if it simply did not process. 

“I’ve been calling out to you for a month and a half, surely you have to know... Shiro, I love you!” In his head, Keith chastised himself for sounding more incredulous than sincere at such an important moment, but he was having a hard time believing Shiro could be so adorably dense. He had prepared himself for Shiro to reject him, after Keith had been so cruel. He had prepared himself for Shiro to hurt him. He had even, despairingly, prepared himself to never again be able to see Shiro for the rest of his life. He had _not_ prepared himself for Shiro to think Keith did not want him. 

The heartbroken look was in Shiro’s eyes again, and Keith hated the thought that he had put it there. “But... Keith, I’m...” he brought up the tips of his fingers to trace the scar that lay beneath his mask. 

Keith’s heart clenched. 

“No! Shiro, please don’t say that,” he fervently pet his cheeks as if his fingertips could deliver his desperate message through the frost-kissed skin. “I’ve been trying to talk to you for weeks to say I’m sorry. I’m so sorry I hurt you, Shiro. I didn’t mean to react that way, and I wanted to explain but then I froze and-” Where to begin. There was so much to say and Keith never was good at finding the right words. His hands stilled on either side of Shiro’s face, steady and firm as he looked intently into Shiro’s steely grays. “Shiro. There’s nothing wrong with you. You’re the most beautiful man, and more importantly the most beautiful _person_ , I’ve ever met. Please, don’t leave. Let me stay by your side always.”

His angel’s face was frozen. Disbelief, confusion, and a pained sort of hope warred in his expression. After a few moments, he looked away from Keith, eyes bright and wet. “That’s my line, Keith. Let me stay by your side; anywhere you go, let me go too.” With some effort, he forced himself to look into Keith’s eyes. A faint blush peeked from beneath the black cloth of his mask.

How could he ever have thought of this man as a killer? One look at the sweet timidity and loving devotion in Shiro’s stormy-gray eyes, and all the doubts and vague fears of the past weeks vanished, leaving only a steady, golden certainty that felt like home. Like Shiro was home, and Keith never wanted to leave it again. He threw himself into the strong embrace once more and felt himself lifted up to his feet. 

The icy air bit his exposed skin, and when he looked up at Shiro he felt the first snowflakes of the season gently alight on his lashes. He had never felt warmer. Shiro was so close, he could taste his sweet breath. So close that all Keith could think about was how soft those plush, ruddy lips would feel against his own. Keith had no idea who moved first. It felt like they were inevitably drawn to one another; they could no more help how their natures brought them together than magnets could. Before either could say another word, they were flush against one another, kissing with desperate abandon.

He had imagined his first kiss with Shiro many times, in many ways, but he was again unprepared - unprepared for the cosmos-shifting impression that he had somehow waited his whole life for this moment. Keith couldn’t think. His mind was blank and blissed out, the feeling of Shiro’s warmth against every part of his body and soul. Shiro’s warm hands on his waist, his velvet lips against his mouth, his teeth sucking on his bottom lip. It was overwhelming. 

Shiro pulled away first, looking dazed and flushed. Keith knew he must look no better. At length, he took stock of their surroundings, slowly coming back to clarity and a sense of time. There was snow in their hair, on their clothes. Keith’s platinum Akira-wig was falling off where Shiro had passionately gripped. Both were breathing heavily. Lotor still lay knocked out behind Shiro. 

Shiro followed Keith’s gaze and looked back with a concerned smile. “Guess we shouldn’t leave him in the snow... though it is tempting,” he finished darkly as he dragged Lotor’s limp body back into the stairwell and closed the door. Keith had followed him, and with one last check of Lotor’s pulse they continued down the stairwell, Shiro leading the way through deserted hallways.

“I think we have a lot to talk about,” Keith said into the comforting dark.

He felt more than saw Shiro smile as he replied, “I guess we do.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So... I initially planned to follow canon with Allurance in this, but in the midst of my attempt to pass the Bechdel test (which is hard when all but 2 of your main characters are male, and your plot needs to center around two male protagonists), Pallura somehow just suddenly inserted itself into the story and I couldn’t figure out how to take it out. Now I’m being held hostage by my own writing. So I guess weirdly this Sheith fic now has Pallura. Pallura fans enjoy, I guess. I’m sure there’s dozens of you out there. Dozens!


	7. Chapter 7

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Explicit. Originally I wasn’t going to put any smut in this fic at all, but it turned out it was actually a necessary part of Shiro’s character development, since a lot of it revolves around body image and accepting being loved by Keith. Put those together and it equals sexytimes. So I guess you guys get smut! Yay! First time writing smut, so umm bear with me and be gentle: "It’s my first time."

Judging by the time they spent walking down spiral staircases, steep inclines, and narrow corridors, Keith figured Shiro was taking him down to his lakeside home again. He spent the time explaining himself and his true thoughts when he took off Shiro’s mask all those weeks ago, how he froze instead of saying what he desperately wished to say. 

“You don’t have to answer if it makes you uncomfortable,” Keith started, “But I’m guessing those scars are not just from shrapnel or combat...?”

“No,” was all Shiro replied, a haunted and distant look in his eyes. 

Keith didn’t say anything more, but he squeezed the hand he was holding and walked closer to Shiro until the look dissipated. 

Shiro, for his part, explained why he didn’t answer Keith’s calls. 

“I did hear you crying for me, but I tried to stay away and give you privacy. You couldn’t possibly really want me, I thought; I had just wormed my way into your trust and into your mind. I thought it would be better for you if you could live a normal life without me. I didn’t want to drag you into this... unending night,” he said with a sweep of his arm, pointedly looking around at the dark halls they crossed. 

“That’s my choice,” said Keith quietly.

“Yes it is...”

“And I don’t  _ want _ a life without you in it. Which reminds me... if you were staying away, then how did you know about Sendak?” 

For a moment, Shiro looked as if he were going to give a different answer, but then a rueful smile escaped him. “I guess you could say that I’m not too good at resisting you. And I’m glad I didn’t, else that bastard would’ve-!” His grip on Keith’s hand tightened and he grit his teeth. Keith soothed him with a gentle hand on his bicep. 

“I’m okay, Shiro.” Adding after a beat, “Thanks to you.”

When they finally made it to Shiro’s cozy drawing rooms, they were practically climbing each other, bumping into walls in their hurry to make it to the bedroom without having to relinquish the constant contact. Shiro picked him up by the thighs, Keith’s legs locking around the larger man’s waist automatically, and carried him through the bedroom door still kissing, sinking onto his knees on the bed and setting Keith down as gently as priceless porcelain.

His fingers ghosted over the bruised skin where Lotor had pressed his filthy hands against Keith. By contrast, Shiro’s touch was reverent as he slipped off the torn remains of Keith’s shirt. The latter shivered at his touch, marveling how different it felt when the man he loved more than anything in this life was the one doing it. 

“Cold?” asked Shiro.

Keith looked up at him, pupils blown wide with desire. “No. Just need more of that.”

Shiro smirked, but cocked his head innocently. 

Keith wasn’t having it. “More of your hands on me, more of your lips on my skin, just- more.” And he moved to undress Shiro as well, but froze before touching. “May I?” he whispered, hands hovering over the shirt buttons. 

Shiro swallowed thickly but nodded once. 

Keith’s fingers worked deftly but slowly, giving his partner ample opportunity to stop him if he started feeling uncomfortable. But Shiro didn’t stop him, just kept looking at him with that helpless trust that reminded Keith of the last time he had held Shiro’s heart in his hands, and then crushed it. The devotion he saw reflected in Shiro’s eyes thrived as fervently as before, as if nothing had happened. It sung with joy, proclaiming that Keith could crush Shiro’s heart a million times, could squeeze the very life out of Shiro’s lungs, and still Shiro would gladly lay his body at Keith’s mercy. 

“What did I do to deserve your love?” Keith startled when he realized he’d spoken out loud. 

Shiro didn’t miss a beat. “Be yourself,” he answered, simply and whole-heartedly. His shirt was open now, revealing a grisly checkerboard of healed gashes, puncture wounds, and what looked like cigarette burns cruelly arranged in the shape of a heart left of his navel. Any inch of skin that remained free of these knotted scars sported a pale latticework of finer scars, small lines criss-crossing each other, leaving no area unmarred. Then Shiro moved his left hand to the opposite arm and carefully, deliberately, pulled off the ever-present black glove to reveal a gleaming, fully-functioning metal arm that joined Shiro’s flesh just above the elbow with a border of irritated red flesh, painful-looking scarring, and unyielding titanium.

Keith didn’t gasp this time, but his eyes watered. It was so unfair. Who could do this to such a gentle man? Bile rose in the back of his throat at the image of Shiro bloodied, in tatters, screaming in pain. He pushed it back. Shiro needed him now. 

He looked up to see Shiro watching him carefully, as if Keith might run at any moment. The younger man couldn’t help but cradle his lover’s face in adoration, placing a kiss over each of his beautiful dusky eyes, then each of his metal fingers, then each scar on his torso. Over the puncture wounds he placed a kiss. Over the long gash-lines he ran a tongue until Shiro had collapsed back onto the bed, flushed and breathing hard. 

“Keith,” he sighed. 

Finished with his ministrations, Keith moved up and hovered one hand over the edge of Shiro’s mask. “Isn’t it dark, beneath a mask, always in the shadows? Let me...” he pinched one corner, wordlessly asking for permission. With softer eyes and a softer voice he intoned, “Let me be your light.” 

Shiro closed his eyes and nodded once more, and Keith slipped the black cloth up and over his head. He was just as gorgeous as he remembered, and so precious and soft, vulnerable and bare before Keith’s study. 

“I love you,” Keith hummed against his lips, taking the rest of their clothing off and luxuriating in the feel of their closeness. They moved awkwardly, nerves and excitement at once causing their hands to shake and their breaths to quicken, but it was perfect. Keith’s hands wandered down and he gasped as he felt the hard length beneath his grip. 

Shiro was... bigger than he imagined. The thought made his mouth water and legs grow weak, to his surprise. He thought he had known himself and his tastes pretty well before now. This was going to be an enlightening night in many ways. 

With his left hand he gave one experimental squeeze followed by an achingly slow but firm stroke. Shiro nearly came undone beneath him. “Ke-eith,” he stuttered. “You’re going to be the death of me.”

“Do you have any... you know...”

Shiro nodded towards the nightstand beside the bed, and Keith fetched a small bottle, pouring the slick liquid over himself while leaning over to whisper in his lover’s ear. “You might be too big for me, baby,” he purred. “Is it okay if I top?” 

The large man beneath him, usually all hard muscle and calm confidence, went beet red as he turned his head to the side. He nodded once, muttering, “I... am ready.” 

The young man above him raised one eyebrow in confusion. “O...kay? That’s good-” 

“No,” interrupted Shiro, pinching the bridge of his nose between two fingers and looking -if possible- all the more adorable for it. “I mean that I’m prepared.”

Keith nodded, still lost. “Yeah, I’m glad. I mean, we of course wouldn’t do anything if you felt like it was too early in the relationship-”

Shiro looked pained as he shook his head. “Keith-I-meant-that-I-prepared-myself-oh-my-god,” he let out in a single breath, eyes wide and horrified as if he suddenly, desperately wished the ground would swallow him whole. 

His partner sat frozen above, still straddling him, his mouth slightly open in understanding. A knowing smirk crept into his expression. “Bit presumptuous of you, no?”

Both the metal and flesh hands were completely covering Shiro’s face now. His shoulders shook after a beat, and he dragged his palms down to peer at Keith and grin back, the usual ease returned. “Who said I presumed anything about  _ you? _ I may have had personal plans for tonight that were waylaid when I saw a damsel in distress during my evening stroll.” 

It was Keith’s turn to huff. He leaned in close to Shiro’s ear again, hissing playfully. “Hope you’re ready to pay for that damsel comment because I’m not gonna go easy on you.” The next second, however, he sat up straight and looked much more earnest than the blustering act of bravado he had performed so far. “Umm, also, I should probably let you know that you may have to let me know what you like because I’ve never actually... I just never really found anyone I wanted to -umm- do it with and-” 

Shiro’s eyes widened, but Keith wasn’t stopping. 

“This may not exactly be the sexiest foreplay conversation, but I’ve read it’s good manners to l- let you know. I umm, even though I haven’t yet had any... experience, I can still show you my papers. I have to get checked out regularly regardless as part of my contract, and Kolivan and Thace are big on regular medical car-” A finger rested against his lips. 

“Thank you, Keith. And you don’t have to worry about being a virgin; I’ll take care of you. Would you like to see  _ my  _ papers?” He was all calm and poise, and Keith was simultaneously thankful and envious that Shiro could do what he was utterly incapable of at the moment: function normally. 

“No,” he shook his head. “Unless there’s something I should know?” 

Shiro chuckled as he turned them so that Keith was lying on his back and Shiro was straddling him. “No. I also am ‘big on medical care,’ as you say - by necessity, as you can see written on my skin. Plus, the time lag with testing isn’t a concern: benefits of being a social outcast is that it’s been a long time...” he trailed off on a shy note.

The slender man beneath him squirmed in sympathetic distress. He wished he could chase away all of Shiro’s sadness, all those self-deprecating looks he wore. He focused instead on letting his fingers show the love he felt for the gorgeous man above him. His hands roved the sculpted body, fingers tracing each scar, reveling in the solid definition, the tensed strength of biceps that must be as thick around as Keith’s thigh. To say nothing of the metal arm that could pin him like a doll to the mattress, face down, ass up, gasping into the pillow-

He gulped.  _ I guess that’s yet another... interest... unlocked.  _ With how conscious Shiro was of his arm, though, that was a kink Keith wouldn’t communicate to him any time soon.

Shiro was a wonder to behold, flushed from Keith’s touch and begging for more with a quiet whine, all power and devastating beauty poised on athletic thighs that flanked either side and made Keith seem small and delicate in comparison. The size difference warmed his blood and shot straight to his groin. He was learning more about himself by the minute. Meanwhile, Shiro had begun to thrust his hips slowly forward, rubbing against Keith’s already painfully sensitive erection. His metal right hand reached behind him to ease himself open; the other he slid over Keith’s cock. 

“Would you like to do it, or shall I?” he breathed out with half-lidded eyes, straight out of Keith’s filthiest wet dreams. It was unfair for one man to be so... 

“I will!” Keith immediately cringed at how eager he sounded. Shiro didn’t laugh, though; he simply smiled like being with Keith was the height of happiness and everything else was inconsequential. Keith understood because he felt the same.

Taking himself in hand, he peppered Shiro’s chest with soft kisses as he slowly slid in, pausing regularly for Shiro to get used to the sensation. It took all his concentration to remain focused. Shiro felt so good, so warm and tight around him that he was about to lose himself. His eyes couldn’t help but flutter closed in pleasure. When he opened them again, Shiro was watching him with a fond smile. 

That wouldn’t do. Keith couldn’t be the only one going out of his mind. Gripping tight onto his lover’s hips, he renewed his thrusting with greater vigor, trying slightly different angles until-

“Keith!” 

There it was. He thought he could just about feel the firm spot with each quickening push. Shiro collapsed forward, his elbows on either side of Keith’s head. His eyes were closed and lips parted in a groan lovelier than any aria, stuttering with the force of Keith’s thrusts. Black sweat-dampened bangs stuck to Keith’s eyelids but he wouldn’t let up, holding onto Shiro for dear life until the older man finally tensed and released, spilling over Keith in a beautiful sticky mess that made him dizzy with want.

Keith slowed and Shiro chuckled shyly, coming down from his high. “That was fast. I thought  _ you _ were supposed to be the virgin here.” 

The smaller man beneath him grinned flagitiously. “Just because I haven’t had field experience doesn’t mean I don’t know the textbook. And I’ve always been a fast learner.”

“Hmm,” Shiro returned, and, still riding Keith, began slowly gyrating his hips in mesmeric circles that Keith followed with hungry eyes. 

“You don’t have to hypnotize me, you know,” he muttered distractedly, still transfixed by the undulating incubus straddling him. “I’ll already give you anything you want.” 

“Anything?” hummed Shiro in that angelic voice like clear bells. Keith stood by what he had first told Pidge and Lance: his Angel’s voice was the most beautiful sound he had ever heard, and likely ever would. 

Shiro picked up speed.

“Anything! Anything! God, Shiro,” Keith cried out, losing track of what he was babbling as Shiro kept a punishing pace, grinding and squeezing until Keith was mindless putty beneath stalwart thighs, sinking his nails into the divine hips riding him, sinking his teeth into his own lip, and gasping his lover’s name like the lingering note of a sacred hymn. He curled up, riding out his orgasm in Shiro’s arms, and when he emptied himself inside Shiro it felt like all the love he held for him poured out into the man, as well. 

Shiro held him while Keith shivered through the aftershocks, lovingly rubbing circles on his back and humming something that sounded suspiciously like  _ Nessun Dorma _ . He pulled back to look at Keith when he felt the latter start to shake in silent laughter. 

“Nessun Dorma, eh? Is that you calling me your princess, or are you suggesting you don’t want us to sleep at all tonight? Well, too bad for you Calaf, but it’s going to be ‘off with your head’ because I  _ already know  _ your true name.” 

A strange look passed over Shiro’s features at that; it made Keith uneasy. 

“W- what is it? Don’t I know your true name? Is there another, even more secret name you haven’t told me yet?” he chuckled nervously. 

“No,” Shiro said softly, but looked to the side - his familiar tell, as Keith was beginning to learn. “But you still don’t... know who I really am. And when you do, then I’ll truly be at your mercy,  _ principessa _ .” He kissed the back of Keith’s hand.

“What’s that supposed to mea-?”

“By the way, I didn’t tell you my request,” Shiro interrupted, rising from where he was still connected to Keith and settling on the bed with his arms around his Turandot. Along the way, Keith  _ almost _ got distracted by the alluringly lurid sight of his own semen dribbling down Shiro’s muscular legs. Shiro had to be doing this on purpose to torture Keith.

“Request? What request, wait what were you talking about earli-”

“You said you would give me anything I wanted.” Shiro looked quite pleased with himself at the sight of Keith spluttering in embarrassment. 

“What? No I didn’t-” Except he did, and Keith vividly recalled screaming it out moments earlier in the throes of ecstasy. Further protests died on his lips. “What d’ya want?” he groused.

“Heh. Has anyone ever told you how cute you are when grumpy? Besides, it’s nothing too horrible. I just want your voice. Would you sing my music?”

Keith perked up. “Your music!? Can I hear it?” 

His lover gathered him closer to him. “In the morning,” he crooned. 

The softness and warmth of those arms was too much to resist; Keith settled into the close embrace and closed his eyes. Just before drifting off, he felt soft lips against his forehead and for a moment couldn’t quite be sure whether this was simply a dream of the past, as once again he fell asleep to gentle humming - no longer  _ Nessun Dorma _ , but a tune he had never heard before and yet fell into place in his heart like a familiar, friendly face. 

~~~

Either Shiro didn’t sleep or the perpetual darkness in these underground quarters made Keith sleep too much, because Shiro was awake when Keith fell asleep and he was awake when Keith rose. The young singer had been fully prepared to be met this morning with the sight of Shiro in his absurd apron again, but instead he woke to the sound of music. By the foot of the bed lay ready for him a bathrobe of rich vermilion that didn’t seem to suit Shiro’s style, and wasn’t in Shiro’s size. It fit Keith perfectly. Since when had Shiro been shopping for clothes for  _ him? _

Once dressed, he pulled aside the black lace curtains that served as a bedroom door and silently crossed the drawing area to where Shiro was sitting at the grand organ on the other end of the rooms. He need not have bothered with stealth. Shiro -mask back on, Keith noticed with a slight frown- was utterly engrossed in his playing, not realizing that Keith had come up behind him until slender arms were hugging his torso. 

The music stopped.

“Keith! Good morning!”

“What was that piece?” Keith said, dusting his right shoulder with soft kisses. 

“Working on the overture.”

“It’s a whole  _ opera _ you’re writing??” 

Shiro looked amused. “Yes... Wouldn’t be the first time either. Just who do you think wrote the opera you’re currently performing at the Palais?”

Keith staggered back so far he almost fell off the raised dais. “ _What?_ Coran said it was some-” _Something very modern by an up-and-coming new composer,_ he had said. Had he really never mentioned his name? “You? But- Damn it, why didn’t I guess? Of course. Coran is the only one besides me you contact. But...” Oh god _._ “This means that the story isn’t just a coincidence...”

“Keith, Keith, calm down.” Shiro had watched him flitter through the entire range of reactions with what looked like suppressed amusement, but stepped in when it appeared Keith was about to spiral. “The irony of it all did not escape me, obviously. But it  _ was _ a coincidence. Even had I wanted to, there’s no way I could write a whole opera in the span of a few weeks. I was working on Lohengrin  _ years  _ before you even returned to the opera house.” Shiro had both hands on Keith’s shoulders now and was guiding him to the kitchen island where breakfast was already waiting. The hands lingered just a little longer than necessary before Shiro turned to heat up the food in the pan - french toast this time... fitting. “Although, in a way you were still the inspiration for Lohengrin,” he said with a laugh that was cut off abruptly short. For a moment he had frozen, a minute stuttering to his movement as he went to tie his ludicrous apron that Keith did not miss after a night of rapt study of that body. Shiro had recovered immediately, as if he didn’t think Keith had seen. 

“How was I the inspiration, if the opera was written years before I came to the opera house?” Keith said lowly, with precision.

Shiro’s back was turned to him, facing the stove, yet Keith swore he could practically  _ hear  _ him thinking. “The character of Lohengrin... he’s like you. Dashing, angelic, beautiful. And he comes swooping in to save Elsa again and again - as many times as it takes. He sees Elsa for who she really is, even when all the people in the world ostracize her.” 

“I haven’t saved you,” Keith pointed out, processing the words left unsaid in Shiro’s explanation.

His partner shrugged. “Just had the feeling you were the kind of person who would do that - help someone in need.” 

Something wasn’t adding up here, though. “How did you even know of me? I may be famous but I get the feeling you didn’t just happen to stumble into my fandom on the pre-teen message boards.”

Shiro was sliding the slices onto their plates, staring without seeing as if turning over something in his head. After a long pause, he finally answered. “I knew your parents.”


	8. Chapter 8

Keith laughed. “Oh yeah? Did they send you to me from where they rest in heaven, oh Angel of Music?”

“Actually, you could say they sent me, yes.” He was dead serious. “But not from heaven, smartmouth. I knew them from when they worked in the opera house - they were friends with my own parents.” 

The laugh faded from Keith’s lips, only the dying remnants of a forced smile left. “I wondered why it seemed like you were so familiar with their story when I told you about them. Why didn’t you say anything?”

Shiro hadn’t touched his french toast, but neither had Keith. He nudged Keith’s plate further towards him, and only spoke again when Keith finally started eating. “What was I going to say? What you joked about? That I’m an angel of music sent to you by your father? I thought that would be emotionally manipulative - of course you would want to talk to me if I had information about your beloved, deceased parents. I couldn’t do that to you. You seemed happy to interact with me even without that, anyway.” 

The young singer nodded thoughtfully. That was a much more considerate answer than he was expecting. He had been ready for some nefarious secret motivation. Perhaps his friends’ chiding had finally gotten to him. Yet Shiro was as sweet as ever, continuously proving them wrong. 

“So,” started Keith, chewing to give himself time to think. “What did they say to you?”

“I didn’t know them that well,” Shiro prefaced. “So I’m afraid I can’t give you much information about them that you don’t already know. They just long ago told me to watch over you.” 

Keith raised one brow. “That’s a lot of years of dedication for an off-the-cuff comment some acquaintances made about babysitting their snotty brat decades ago.”

“Babysitting? Ah no, it was more like, ‘to take good care of you.’ I wasn’t old enough yet to be babysitting you.”

Keith was having trouble imagining what sort of situation this could possibly have been, where his parents entrusted a child they hardly knew to ‘take care of’ yet another small child. But there were so many more questions to cover first.

“They died many, many years ago. You’ve been here a long time, then. ”

“Not that long, actually,” he replied with a rueful smile as if laughing at an inside joke only he knew.

Keith was about to ask what  _ that  _ meant when his phone started ringing. 

“Pidge,” he uttered, raising one finger and walking away from the table, phone already to his face. “Hello? Yeah, I- Can you hear me? Sorry, there’s terrible reception down here... Where am I? Oh uh... Just, downstairs. One of the lower levels. N- nevermind that, what do you-? Ok ok stop screaming; I get the picture. I’ll be right there.” Keith whirled around, pocketing his phone and hurrying back to give Shiro’s torso one more suffocating squeeze for the road. “I have to run. We sort of left everyone in a frenzy up there last night.”

“We seem to keep doing that,” Shiro grinned. 

“Well, their lead disappeared overnight (again), their second leading man was mysteriously found with a black eye passed out in an abandoned stairwell, and I’m willing to bet most of their cast is nursing a killer hangover, based on the way the festivities were progressing last night. I’m actually surprised it took Pidge this long to hit me with the frantic call - or not so surprised: she was probably hungover, too. Long story short, I’d better go if I still want to sing your Elsa.” 

It was easier said than done, though. He just couldn’t bring himself to stop kissing Shiro’s warm lips. All Keith wanted to do was bask in the golden afterglow of the best night he’d had in a long time. And saying it in his head made him realize how true it really was: not only had he reunited with Shiro, something for which he had almost lost hope, but also he had actually  _ slept _ . He hadn’t been able to catch a good night’s sleep since the day he and Shiro parted, and for almost two months had the pale face and black eye-bags to show it. 

Shiro made it no easier to leave. He kissed Keith back with the desperation of a man unsure that he would ever again see his lover, hands possessively roaming and caressing until Keith forced them apart just so he was not tempted to pull them to the bedroom instead. 

“Will I see you tonight?” he whispered against the taller man’s neck. 

“Yes.” 

Keith tore himself away and took pride in the fact that he only ran back to Shiro two more times before actually leaving. 

~~~

It was disgusting. He was happy for his friend, and concerned, and confused. But primarily disgusted. Lance sat on the edge of the stage, watching Keith and Lotor (wearing a heavy amount of concealer around his eye, much to Lance’s amusement) and the rest of the cast run through a few key scene transitions before tomorrow’s show. 

It had certainly been an eventful morning. He, Hunk, Pidge, and Allura had woken up sprawled in a communal heap on Keith’s giant memory-foam mattress with no memory of how they had gotten there beyond their joint decision to play a drinking game at the cast party the night before. Shortly after breakfast, they heard by word of mouth from the other cast members that had crashed at the opera house after the party that Lotor had been found passed out and beaten up in some godforsaken corner of the Palais.  _ Probably deserved it, too, _ thought Lance as he watched the man in question currently attempting to emote in a scene without wincing from his bruised cheek.

The one person that had been conspicuously missing this morning had been Keith. He hadn’t been in his bedroom with Lance and the others, and clearly he hadn’t spent the night with Lotor, as his friends had initially assumed upon waking up in his Keith-less bed. Concerned glances were exchanged and dots were quickly connected; they were all readying themselves to receive radio silence for the next few days when Pidge’s first call connected immediately, much to everyone’s surprise.

Keith himself had appeared out of thin air a little later, looking better than he had every morning in recent memory. Despite the group’s skeptical prodding, he stubbornly asserted that he had merely drunk too much the night before and passed out in one of the basement alcoves he used to haunt. Lance didn’t believe it for a second, and he was pretty sure neither did the others. Keith looked well-rested, color in his cheeks and a spring in his step, try as he might to hide it. That just did not happen after sleeping all night on cold, hard stone.

It was disgusting. Keith kept zoning out during rehearsal, distractedly daydreaming during downtime for his character until someone called his attention. Or he would fall into this idiotic little smile when he thought no one was looking. It was gross to look at and for the life of him Lance couldn’t imagine what the hell there was to be so happy about. Maybe his friend had simply finally snapped. Too many nights of sleep deprivation. 

Sometimes Keith’s ditzy smile would melt into a bittersweet expression that Lance had only ever seen on that face when his friend spoke about his deceased parents, the musical prodigy couple that had perished tragically in the infamous opera house fire almost two decades ago. Keith didn’t speak much of his parents, and the team knew better than to ask, but thanks to Pidge Lance knew that Keith’s relationship with the memory of his parents was conflicted: at once idolatrous and self-conscious about the obligation to live up to their blindingly-bright legacy.

It made Lance thankful for his uncomplicated family ties. Sure, he worried about ensuring they all had what they needed to live well back in Cuba, but he never had to worry about his relationship with them. His family was as close, loving, and supportive as it was large, and he couldn’t imagine what it would be like to lose them all like Keith had.

“Ow! Did you step on me on purpose, you little-?” 

“Sorry Lotor,” Akira replied absent-mindedly, much to Lotor’s surprise. It was as if the uppity little diva didn’t even remember the night before! Well, if that was how he wanted to play it, Lotor certainly wasn’t about to turn himself in for attempted sexual assault. 

“I- it’s fine. Can we take it from the top, Maestro?” Lotor unconsciously rubbed his cheek where the Phantom’s punch still smarted. He had heard from his parents that the Phantom had a weak spot for Akira, but the close-quarters encounter with the shadowy figure had both confirmed it  _ and  _ left Lotor a bit more wary of targeting Akira and incurring ‘His’ wrath.

“Certainly!” Coran rapped his baton smartly on the music stand before him. “Then everyone, da capo, per favore- Allura! Is that a phone? No texting during rehearsal! Horns, I want a bit more feeling in that final swell, remember that this is the romantic culmination of Elsa’s and Lohengrin’s romantic setup. If we can’t sell the love in this scene, the wedding won’t have any impact on the audience!” 

At the mention of Allura’s name, Lance looked over with what he felt must surely be heart-shaped pupils, but the person he saw hurriedly stash their phone was not Allura but Pidge, standing awkwardly on the far edge of the stage, practically hiding in the shadows. She was looking at Allura with a similar smile to Keith’s.  _ Seems like everyone’s gotten into the special brownies today, _ thought Lance.

Allura was giggling silently in her seat, staring right back at Pidge. Lance sighed. How nice. Girls always had such strong friendships.

~~~

Akira was back on his game, everyone agreed. Critics and coworkers alike noticed the change immediately after Lohengrin’s opening night. His performances, though always perfect, now had once again the fiery, otherworldly passion that drew fans to Akira and audiences to opera seats. Even Zarkon and Haggar had to begrudgingly admit defeat for the time being, and the team had a blessed rest from the duo’s hitherto ceaseless machinations.

“Just in time for Yuletide!” Hunk had said cheerily before promptly dragging them all through town on shopping trip after shopping trip, Christmas tree hunting, night market carousing, and so on. There was the Winter Fair, then the Year-End farmer’s market, then the Dickens Festival. ‘Rest,’ they had thought. What rest? Pidge was beginning to wish Zarkon and Haggar would hatch another scheme just so she could bask in the relative peace of only having to worry about Keith’s well-being and not about spending another full day helping Hunk pick out different-colored scarves for his many aunts’ and cousins’ Christmas presents, or taste-testing his revolutionary new take on gingerbread. 

On the other hand, it was nice to see Keith enjoying himself again. He had gained back the weight he had lost, he laughed and smiled more often than ever before, and -most telling of all- he went along with his friends on every single new outing. Where before they practically had to drag him out of whatever dark room he was brooding in that day, now he shrugged and nodded, “Sure,” at the mere suggestion of a group excursion. 

“It’s unnatural,” Lance had commented and shuddered theatrically. “Where’s the emo boy we all know and love?” 

But Pidge felt the anxiety that had made a home in her heart these past few months finally start to ease. The one nagging oddity she couldn’t ignore was that despite going out easily, Keith would often look like he wanted to get back to the opera house as early as possible. Sometimes, when the group was having a particularly wonderful time -like watching fireworks over the Seine lighting up in bright colors the lively crowd at the night market- she would catch Keith smiling and then quickly sighing, as if missing something. Then there were his mysterious habits. 

He had always been a bit of a loner; his celebrity persona had become notorious for it. When they first came to the opera house together so many months ago, Pidge had to search for hours on end for Keith each time he inevitably stole away to some dark corner. Recently, however, this tendency had picked up noticeably, only standing out all the more for how sociable he had otherwise become. Until now it had been a pretty safe bet to find Keith of an evening lounging in his private quarters or playing video games in his dressing room. Lately, however, he would disappear at odd hours of the day for long stretches at a time. More often than not, he would show up for breakfast in the staff lounge coming from a different direction than his bedroom. Whenever asked, he would say he had gone out for a morning jog, despite not a hair being out of place, or for a smoke, despite not having smoked a day in his life for as long as Pidge had known him. 

Pidge wanted to ask. They all did. But Keith looked so happy, so much healthier and livelier than he had for a long time, that it was tempting to look the other way. Besides, there were other preoccupations to fill their time. Lohengrin was ending its run soon, for one, and the next production had not yet even been announced. Then there was the end of year masquerade ball, the grandest function on the opera house’s annual calendar. 

All the crème de la crème of Paris society attended, dressed to the nines in splendid outfits, luxurious costumes, and, of course, fantastical and/or grotesque masks of all shapes and sizes on every face. Each year offered a fresh opportunity for the most powerful and beautiful denizens of the city to try to one-up each other in the extravagance of their disguises. It was by all accounts a splendid and ostentatious affair.

Keith found it terribly exhausting. It was tradition (and probably explicitly written somewhere in their contract) for the opera company to attend, and most of the cast looked forward to it all year. Keith, on the other hand, saw it for what it was: a night-long marathon of smiling at the sponsors whose money kept the opera house running, of watching sycophants try to rub elbows with the influential and the rich, of being paraded and showcased like a pretty doll to be pinched and prodded and ogled by important businessmen. He just thanked his lucky stars that according to Pidge’s intel, the so-called Raoul wouldn’t be there. Keith had no reason to believe that they had met before, but if the patron’s earlier sudden and insistent protection of Keith’s position as lead tenor was any indication, the young idol had every reason to believe this Raoul fellow would likely be just as disgusting a lecherous scion as every other CEO that tried to get handsy with Akira at this kind of social function. He felt nauseated just thinking of it. 

Perverts unfortunately abounded in the world of entertainment fame, and Keith had always hardly cared, since he felt confident in his ability to defend himself. That is, he hadn’t cared until Shiro came along. Thinking now of Shiro’s loving caresses and gentle hands running over every inch of his body, worshipping, devoted, the thought of any other’s touch on him felt particularly repugnant, even frightening. 

Before he realized it, he was already longingly treading the familiar path to Shiro’s rooms deep beneath the opera house. Startled, he looked around to make sure he was not being followed. He had to be more careful. The slightest slip-up could mean disaster for his gentle ghost. This hideaway was all his beloved had left to escape the harsh reality of the outside world; Keith would die before he betrayed the secret haven.

“Keith,” the warm greeting washed over him like sunshine on his face. The warm hug that immediately followed was better. Keith felt himself lifted up and twirled around, then kissed deeply until he was practically bending backward draped over Shiro’s beefy forearm. 

Keith laughed. “It’s only been six hours, Shiro. And we were going at it all night until then.” 

“Doesn’t mean I can’t be thrilled to see you. Shiro loves you, baby.” 

The raven-haired man rolled his eyes in such an exaggerated fashion they hurt as he struggled to right himself from the dip in which Shiro had him. “God, you’re terrible. If I had known you were this cheesy I wouldn’t have chosen the name ‘Angel’ for you.”

“Oh no? What would you have chosen instead?” Shiro was now pecking tiny kisses all over Keith’s face until the latter was forced to break down laughing. 

“Hmm, Woodpecker?” he gasped between desperate giggles. 

Shiro pulled back from his kissing assault and looked Keith dead in the eye before initiating a truly outrageous eyebrow waggle. “I  _ am _ rather partial to wood... and peckers.”

Keith groaned. Shiro lifted him up onto his waist, laughing all the way to the bedroom. 

~~~

Dusk was falling fast outside the windows, making it difficult to see the gilded, turn-of-the-century decorations in the unlit, stately room of the Palais. The sun set like a death warrant on the bright day, turning everything red for a few moments. Lotor sat dwarfed in a red leather armchair with a tall studded back, looking for all the world like a penitent child. 

Nevertheless, he started with his usual debonair tone, “It’s getting a bit dark in here, why don’t we-?”

“Silence!” A growl came from behind the desk the pale blond dandy faced. A figure remained hooded in the shadows cast from the dying daylight. “I didn’t think such a simple task would be so difficult for you. How do you account for your failure?”

“Father, with all due respect, the task itself  _ was _ simple. It would have been an easy thing to bring Akira to his knees and begging if it hadn’t been for that damn opera ghost. He’s a hell of a bodyguard.” The young man massaged his right cheek reflexively. 

“Yes... I can see now that he is too much for you.” The way he said ‘you’ brought Lotor back to memories of his childhood, ever striving for an approval that he never got. 

“As I said, Akira is an easy target. It’s the Phantom that is a dangerous opponent.”

Zarkon waved dismissively, downturned mouth resting against the fist of his other hand. 

“My lord.” A figure stepped out from one end of the room where it had been silently perusing a stack of paperwork. “Perhaps we would do better to entrust Lotor with a different chore. I have been looking into the matter we discussed regarding the budget...?”

Zarkon did not reply, but nodded thoughtfully and for a beat no one spoke. Turning to Lotor, he began again in an almost playful tone - for Zarkon, anyway. “You have heard about our esteemed benefactor, I trust?” 

Was that a joke? Of course he had. His father hadn’t stopped talking about the man since he had first reached out, offering to put his considerable wealth at the opera’s disposal. Lotor said none of this. Instead, he opted for the mild reply, “Raoul?”

“Indeed.” Zarkon was grinning now. Something almost frightening in its appearance. “He is a... mysterious figure. Refuses any in-person meetings; does not provide even a last name. Your mother has scoured the Paris records and there is not a single Raoul in the city that fits the bill nor has access to the kinds of resources our patron apparently does. Yet he is generous with his contributions and demands very little say over the direction of the opera house’s running aside from our reserving box five for every performance, so we have kept our silence thus far.” 

“...Until now,” Lotor provided. “What has changed, then? What happened?”

It was Haggar who answered this time. “Akira happened. We heard nary a word from Raoul -aside from small missives accompanying his timely donations- until we made moves to supplant Akira. Then he passionately defended the security of Akira’s position. Sound familiar?”

The young man was slow on the uptake, but when the implication finally made itself clear, his eyes opened wide in dawning realization. “Surely you can’t mean...” A strange burst of incredulous laughter escaped him, cutting sharply through the silence of the room and sounding out of place against the polished demeanors of his two parents. “What you’re suggesting is preposterous! A man with those kinds of riches and power isn’t skulking around in the dark corners of a gloomy opera house, mother.”

She scoffed. “Vulgar child. Your outburst is as crass as your lack of vision. Raoul is a powerful man; he has methods that do not require direct oversight. For all we know, this so-called Phantom is in his employ. The point is that we can use this to our advantage.” 

“I thought you were satisfied with Raoul as a sponsor?”

“Not if he means to waylay our plans.” 

Zarkon made to stand up behind the desk. “Let this be a lesson in strategy for you, boy.” Erect he cut an even more formidable figure to the young blond imperceptibly trembling in the red leather armchair. “No matter how useful or close an ally is, you must always prepare yourself to be able to cut them down when the time comes. That means holding the key to their weakness, and that means knowing your...  _ future _ enemy.” Black onyx cane in hand, he strode around the desk until he stood directly before his son. “The annual masquerade ball is fast approaching. The oldest and most distinguished families in Paris will attend, those with fortunes comparable to Raoul’s. Some of them  _ must _ know him. You will find out all you can about Raoul’s true identity, by any means necessary. You are dismissed.” 

Lotor rose from his seat suppressing a shiver. ‘Any means.’ His father would sooner join the chorus line himself than care whether his son had to whore himself out to every wealthy old coot in the city, as long as it meant Zarkon got something he wanted. 

He had almost made it to the door when he heard his father call out once more, “Oh, and Lotor...” 

Heart in his throat, he turned around, the boy within imagining it was to see his father’s affectionate countenance apologizing and entreating him to be careful on his mission. The words rang out clear and cold across the gulf of space between them: 

“Do not disappoint me again.”


	9. Chapter 9

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Me before writing this: "I’m going to write a simple PotO AU with no smut."  
> Me seven chapters in: "Dammit there’s no way to tell this relationship progression story without smut or without being awkward about avoiding the smut."  
> Me nine chapters in: "It would be weird to tell this next part without another scene of touching intimacy... alright I guess this is a smut fic now..."

The Palais Garnier was beautiful in the winter. This winter in particular had been exceptionally cold so far, starting with that unexpected snowfall on Lohengrin’s opening night. No more snow had fallen since then, but the crisp December air outdoors sold the feeling that it was truly Christmastide, as did the copious evergreen garlands, red ribbons, and golden bells that adorned the halls of the Palais indoors. It was almost sensory overload to walk through the already-gilded Grand Foyer and Grand Staircase in their new holiday vestments. 

Deep in the damp -and now, in December, chilly- bowels of the opera house, in an open set of rooms that lay by the side of the indoor lake, it was festive all the same, albeit more modestly so. 

“A bit more to the right. No, that doesn’t look quite right. Try left again. Hmm, no, definitely right.”

“Keith - _ darling- _ for the love of god, make up your mind!” An exasperated Shiro sounded out in a strained voice, sweating from the effort of balancing on a questionably-sound ladder with his arms fully outstretched holding a heavy wreath against the coving of one stony wall. 

“Okay okay, right there is fine,” huffed the man beneath him, currently stretched indolently across a red velvet chaise longue. He looked like an emperor, draped in nothing but his usual red silk robe which hung carelessly - _ tantalizingly _ , thought Shiro- off one shoulder. At least, he would have, if not for his charmingly tawdry pose (one leg was hitching up the bottom of the slippery robe and exposing everything) and the orange Cheeto fingers his cute gremlin was now sucking with obscene gusto. Shiro was gone on him.

“That’s the last of them.” He climbed back down the ladder and ran a metal hand -ungloved now, as he usually was in front of Keith, though the mask was still a constant outside the bedroom- through his hair, combing back his sweaty forelock. The place looked pretty good, he thought as he surveyed the area. He hadn’t bothered to decorate in past winters but Keith breathed new life into him, into every corner of his life, and that included his home. 

“Not bad for a cave-dweller,” his lover drawled out between open-mouthed Cheeto-crunching. He was also looking around at the garlands, wreaths, and ribbons they had put up together over the course of the morning, the culmination of a week’s worth of work transforming the space into something out of a Better Homes and Gardens seasonal spread.

Shiro shot him a smirk, then jutted out his jaw while bunching his brows together and grunting, “Mm. Me cave-dweller. Make cave pretty. Bring pretty mate to pretty cave,” while burying his face in Keith’s side. 

Keith shrieked with laughter as he doubled over from the tickling. “No! I take it back! I take it back! It’s a lovely cave!” 

But Shiro had already draped him over one shoulder like a prize buck and was walking around in a circle. “Hmm,” he grunted again. “Plenty meat on this one. Eat good tonight!” 

“I thought I was a mate, not food?” 

Switching back to his usual husky tone, Shiro set him back down and winked. “Why not both?”

A light blush sprang up on Keith’s cheeks. Shiro’s entire existence was really unfair; how could anyone resist any part of him? “A- anyway, that reminds me. [“That reminded you of something? I’m worried,” Shiro muttered beneath his breath.] I got you something, but it’s in my room upstairs. I’ll be right back.” 

Keith ran into the bedroom and slipped into a red crop top and his standard black bike shorts, what Lance called his “booty shorts” ever since he found out Keith’s sexual orientation. 

“They’re not bike shorts anymore when they’re that length!” Lance had said. 

“Why not? I saw an ad where they were clearly labeled bike shorts.” 

“Those were  _ women’s  _ bike shorts, Keith.” 

It confounded Keith why every person in his life seemed to hold an opinion on his wardrobe choices. Still thinking about James’ ‘combat boots’ jab, he didn’t notice until he was stepping into one of the corridors that led out of the subterranean area back to the main halls of the opera house, that Shiro was following behind. 

“Where are  _ you _ going?” Keith asked.

“With you.” 

“Are you crazy? They’ll see you!”

Shiro only grinned and waved the thought away. “I’ll be careful, and there’s hardly anyone here this morning. Christmas eve; they’re all with their families.” 

Keith gave in with a reluctant nod and narrowed eyes and the two of them stole through the winding hidden passageways until they found the door that allowed them to slip into one of the main halls. 

“See? No one here.”

“Yeah yeah,” Keith mumbled, taking the usual route back to his quarters. “Don’t come crying to me when you get caught. What am I supposed to say? `Oh don’t mind this guy, it’s just the Phantom that supposedly doesn’t exist and whom I happen to be railing on a regular basis.’”

Shiro giggled beside him. 

They made their way to Keith’s rooms almost recklessly, too distracted playing a groping, raunchy game of keep-away as they walked, laughing breathlessly in between quick kissing sessions against the walls they passed. It took them much longer to get to Keith’s rooms than it should have, but they eventually made it. They were just about to round the last corner before Keith quickly sucked in a breath and forcefully pulled Shiro back and behind a heavy curtain covering one of the recessed windows. 

Immediately catching on, Shiro went still beside Keith, holding the smaller man against his chest as he took silent, measured breaths. They could hear voices approaching, and they were familiar.

“...gone again, as usual. I’m starting to think we should search our son’s drawers for the Devil’s Lettuce,” one of the voices was saying. 

A smoother voice with a soft foreign accent replied. “Keith is not doing  _ drugs _ , Lance.”

“Oh yeah? Well as you can see, he’s not in his room, and it’s barely noon. You know mullet-head doesn’t wake up before one unless it’s absolutely necessary, which means he slept somewhere else,  _ again _ . For all we know, he’s philandering around the whole of France chasing every skirt -or, I guess, pant-leg- with a pulse.” 

“Ha! That’s a good one,” boomed Hunk’s friendly baritone. “Keith isn’t interested in anyone, dude. I’m pretty sure his self-proclaimed homosexuality is practically theoretical at this point.” 

“That’s not true; he  _ was  _ interested in  _ one _ person...” Allura returned in a subdued voice. The voices fell silent in a pregnant pause.

Behind their curtain, Keith and Shiro caught each other’s gaze and quickly looked away, both red. They couldn’t hear the sound of footsteps anymore, which meant the trio had stopped walking, and from the sound of their last words, they had stopped right at the intersection Keith had almost rounded. The young singer became suddenly, painfully aware that his and Shiro’s feet were visible beneath the almost-floor-length curtain, and he wasted no time communicating this with silent pointing, hoping Shiro would get the message to not move his feet and thus draw attention to their hiding space. 

“He hasn’t talked much about ‘him’ lately, huh...” Hunk started again, in a low, sober tone. 

“Used to be, we couldn’t get ‘im to shut  _ up  _ about the guy,” Lance agreed. His voice hiked up in mimicking falsetto, “Oh guys, I’m in love!-” A furious blush crept over Keith’s face, but to his great mortification Lance just continued, “I don’t even know his name and he won’t tell me anything about himself, but he’s  _ sooo _ great. You guys just don’t understand!” A red-cheeked Keith glared at the sculpted pecs that were the cause of his current humiliation. Before him, Shiro looked down at his lover fondly, seemingly shaking from the effort of holding back a laugh. In his normal voice, Lance droned on, “You’d think the Phantom had a candy-coated dick the size of a horse-” 

“Ugh dude come on. I don’t wanna imagine Keith doing... that!” Hunk groaned. “We just ate breakfast. You want me to barf out Coran’s fruitcake?”

Shiro was shaking so hard with suppressed laughter that he was getting perilously close to moving the curtain, so to distract himself he instead swooped down and stole a kiss from Keith - a challenge, considering he first had to pry the smaller man’s hands from his now impossibly-red countenance. He silently peppered soft pecks all over the ruddy face until they were both noiselessly giggling and putting their fingers to their own lips in mute chastisement of each other. Keith felt like a high schooler, kissing and laughing behind a curtain, hiding just out of sight of some teacher. Not that he had personally experienced it before, he thought with bittersweet bemusement. Pickings had been slim for a petite gay high school boy with a strong distaste for people at large. But he had witnessed his fellow classmates in similar situations, and though he would die before admitting it, he had always felt a small pang of envy at how happy they looked at times like these. Now,  _ he _ was happy. It was almost difficult to admit to himself, but it was the truth. Despite the worldwide fame and success, the international traveling, and the outpouring of love he as an icon had received from millions of people all over the globe, he felt happier now than he had since his parents had gone, and it was all because of Shiro. The familiar surge of fondness and joy overtook him and he had to shake himself subtly to remain focused on staying hidden.

“It is strange, isn’t it? To go from unhealthy obsession to total silence on the subject?” Allura was saying.

“Maybe he gave up on him? Pidge did say that the Phantom wasn’t responding to his calls. Maybe he just accepted it and moved on,” said Hunk. 

“Yeah right, this is Keith we’re talking about,” Lance chimed in. “He’s about as stubborn as a mule with a traumatic brain injury. He’s stubborn, pig-headed, single-minded, and-” There was a pause. “And as of now, 45 minutes late to our scheduled Friendmas Eve get-together.” 

Keith slapped a hand to his forehead, the sound thankfully muted by the heavy curtain. He had totally forgotten. 

“And you’re sure you told him we were picking him up? Maybe he thought he was supposed to meet us at your place, or mine,” said Allura. 

“...Let’s just get back to our place, in case he’s headed there. Not that I’m saying you didn’t tell him, of course!” Hunk stammered out, presumably to his roommate. “Besides, Pidge might show up there, too. Is she joining us tonight? Did you talk to her too, Lance?” 

The trio had started walking again, right past Keith and Shiro’s curtain. 

“No, she flew out yesterday to spend Christmas with Matt and their parents,” Allura replied. 

_ Wait a minute:  _ _ Allura _ _ replied? _ Keith leaned forward to hear more clearly.

Lance seemed to share Keith’s confusion. “How do  _ you _ know that?” 

“Oh uh... just... she told me,” was the last thing Keith heard Allura say before the voices receded. 

“Whew, that was close,” whispered Shiro, peeking through the curtains to confirm the coast was clear. 

They slipped into Keith’s quarters immediately and sank on the settee with a sigh. It  _ had _ been close, in more ways than one. To begin with, Keith had apparently not been as canny in deceiving his friends as he had thought: they were definitely suspicious. He would have to be more careful. He looked down at the delicate but conspicuous diamond ring that hadn’t left his ring finger since Shiro had first gifted it to him. With tender care, he slipped it off and placed it on his nightstand. Then, he stood up and reached into the fridge in his drawing room for a gorgeously-decorated cherry pie in a box with a bright red bow. 

Shiro’s eyes had been glued to his every move since Keith had taken off the ring, but they snapped to the box now as his face lit up. “For me? Is this my Christmas present?”

“One: yes, I figured that holed up down there you don’t get to go out for much fresh food and Hunk dragged us to the farmer’s market yesterday. I wanted to bring a little piece of it back to you.” Shiro’s velvet-gray eyes melted into a loving gaze. “And as for question number two: no. Your Christmas gift will come later. First, I have to go to a Friendmas Eve party and convince my friends I’m neither doing drugs nor sleeping my way through Paris.” 

~~~

Miraculously, Keith managed to play off his tardiness as due to confusion on where they were supposed to meet. “We must have just missed each other while I was on my way back to the opera house, thinking Lance must have told me wrong after all!”

Friendmas Eve was a success, despite the absence of their favorite short-statured genius of questionable morals. Coran arrived shortly after Keith, and even Kolivan and Thace stopped by for a brief appearance and to drop off presents before disappearing again with mysterious holiday plans on which they were strangely tight-lipped. Keith was able to attempt to act more naturally on the subject of the Phantom before the rest of Team Voltron got too curious. The day passed in a blurry haze of eating, drinking, and the pleasant fuzzy feeling of being surrounded by family that Keith hadn’t felt in ages. The night ended with all of them passed out on the couch and the plush rug in front of the roaring fireplace, halfway through  _ Miracle on 34th Street _ . All but Keith. 

As soon as he was confident that the others were sound asleep, he slipped out of the apartment and practically flew back to the Palais Garnier, making a pit stop by his room before heading down the familiar staircases and halls to Shiro’s door. The opera house was completely deserted, and every sound echoed unnervingly off of the walls. He began to take quieter steps just to settle the discomfort that arose in his stomach every time the noise of his boots rang in the muted darkness. Consequently, he was able to hear Shiro before he even entered the drawing rooms that had become his second home. 

The sound was not very clear at first. Keith thought it was the ambient static of his lover moving objects around until there came the unmistakable sound of a sniff. He froze with his hand above the door handle. It came again, louder this time. 

Shiro was crying. 

What if Shiro was having another panic attack? Keith had to help; he would always be there for Shiro. Anxiety over walking in on such a scene warred with anxiety that something might have happened to distress Shiro. The latter won out, as it always would where Shiro was concerned. 

He opened the door to a composed Shiro sitting on a sofa, looking down at a picture in his hands, fresh tear tracks streaking his cheeks. It was one of the rare moments when he was not wearing his mask. At the sound of the door opening, he hastily hid the picture and dragged an ungloved hand briskly across his eyes. “Keith.” He sounded surprised, and hoarse. 

Keith said nothing, but walked over to him and wrapped his arms around him until he felt comfortable enough to talk. 

“Sorry, I didn’t think you’d be back tonight.”

“Don’t apologize for this,” Keith responded immediately. Softer, he added, “Were you crying because you didn’t think I’d be back?”

The older man shook his head with a gentle smile. “No. I’m glad you’re spending time with your friends. I can tell they’re like family to you. I was... crying... for the family I lost.” He had pronounced the word ‘crying’ as if it physically pained him to say it. When Keith didn’t say anything but stared with an open expression as if inviting him to speak, Shiro continued. “It was around this time of year when I first found out what happened to them.”

“You weren’t with them when it happened?” 

“No. I was recovering in a hospital overseas at the time. The damage was... extensive, so they had to keep me abroad for a long time before I was stable enough to be transferred to a hospital back home. Hell of a homecoming that was.” He was silent for a long time, Keith rubbing his back in soothing circles with his forehead against one broad shoulder. Finally, he spoke again, voice a little surer this time. “Coran tried to hide it from me at first, but there was only so much he could do when no one but him showed up to see me in the hospital.” 

“I’m sorry. I wish I could have met your parents... And your brother. How did it happen?” Keith wasn’t sure if he was asking about Shiro’s parents, or about whatever caused damage so serious that Shiro wasn’t even stable enough to be transferred. Based on the deliberate nature of some of the injuries he had seen as he lovingly explored that body night after night, however, Keith could take a guess as to the latter.

“Fire,” Shiro said simply, and Keith inhaled sharply. “Though luckily most of the mansion survived.”

A brief pause, then Keith raised a single eyebrow. “Mansion, eh? So you’re a Young Lord?” 

That earned him one of those warm chuckles he hoarded zealously in his memory. “How else do you think I could afford living jobless down here?” 

“Now that I think about it, you did mention your parents had the means to support you in your music education. I guess I didn’t realize just how much ‘means’ that was. But in that case, you must have been a pretty high-profile family.” Shiro stiffened almost imperceptibly. “Aren’t there any people wondering where you are or why they never see you?” 

When he finally answered, he did so carefully, as if weighing each word. “Many think I never made it back from duty... Some know I did. Those that do know, think I’m a recluse at the mansion, driven to isolation by my grief and whatever horrors I saw abroad. I suppose all of that is true in a way...”

“Seriously?” Keith gaped. “They just, they all think you’re still in there, day and night. And they don’t try to like, see you or- what? How!”

Shiro smiled, small and bashful. “I have a devoted staff to help me maintain the image. Most have worked for my family for generations, and loved my parents very much. They spoil me, quite frankly. But that’s how I was able to move in here without anyone noticing - and with Coran’s help, of course.”

Keith’s head was buzzing with questions and he was desperate to voice them, but worried about bombarding Shiro when he was already so vulnerable. “Coran... you knew him from before, then?” Before the scars, that was.

“Old family friend,” Shiro said slowly, eyes searching Keith’s for something unknown.

“And, why the opera house? Why move in  _ here _ , of all places?”

Shiro stood up so quickly, Keith almost fell back onto the couch. Keith had found the line. The larger man quickly grabbed the picture he had been holding when Keith entered and clutched it to his chest before Keith could see. He was facing away from Keith now, but turned back around to solemnly meet his violet eyes. 

“Keith,” he uttered, and something in his voice sounded broken and strained. “I know I just told you about the fire, and my home, and my injuries... They’re all very identifying, Keith.” 

Keith hated the way Shiro was speaking now, like Keith was a wild animal that needed to be approached carefully, or like he was a dangerous enemy with whom Shiro needed to negotiate. Like Keith was a stranger, and not his lover who would give his right hand without a second thought if it meant Shiro could have his own back. 

Understanding dawned on him like a lead weight. How could Shiro think Keith would ever do that? He stood up to face Shiro directly, careful not to make it seem like he was reaching for the picture Shiro guarded so fearfully, holding it tightly against his heart. “Shiro, I don’t need to know anything except what you tell me. When you’re ready, I’ll hear it from you yourself. And if that time never comes...” He swallowed. “Then it never comes, and it is clearly something I don’t need to know. It’s not my place to demand anything from you, nor would I ever want to.” 

Shiro stared at him like a second head had sprouted from Keith’s neck. Keith was just as surprised at  _ himself _ . He had always thought he was incapable of ever finding the right words to say at the right time. Now he wondered if all he needed was for it to be a crucial time for the person most important to him. Shiro put the picture away and moved to embrace Keith, every kiss painstakingly sweet, as if he was pouring all his gratitude, love, and appreciation into each one. 

They stayed like that for a long while, softly comforting each other for every hurt and scar each had endured before they found the other, exchanging a few words and a great number of caresses. They must have moved into the bedroom at some point because Keith found himself on the bed beneath Shiro before he could clear his head of the delicious buzz Shiro’s lips induced. 

“I haven’t given you your Christmas gift yet,” he managed to get out as Shiro trailed lazy open-mouthed kisses down his throat. The latter started to unbutton Keith’s shirt when his fingers froze in place, the shirt still only half-open.

“Keith...” 

“Merry Christmas?” He finished shrugging off the shirt himself and then his pants to reveal the candy-apple red lingerie he had donned during the pit stop to his own room. 

Judging by Shiro’s fast-approaching flush, it was a success. The older man looked away for a second, eyes seemingly trying to focus on any sight but the one before him. He finally took a deep breath and looked back at Keith, sighing to himself the tired mantra about patience and focus. 

“So you like it, then?”

“Was it very expensive?” His partner asked in a rough, low voice.

“What? No, it was jus- Ah!” The sentence wasn’t fully out and Shiro was already tearing off the garment... with his fucking  _ teeth.  _ Keith’s eyes nearly popped out as he sent quick thanks up above for having lived long enough to be blessed with a sight such as this one. Perhaps it was a gift from Gay-Santa. Perhaps he had a fairy drag-mother somewhere whom he owed big time, and any second now she would arrive in stilettos and a crown to collect her due for granting Keith this Prime-Grade hunk of beef. Would his soul be sufficient payment? Probably not.

The lingerie lay in tatters across his naked body, and Shiro -oblivious to Keith’s inner soliloquizing- hovered above looking breathless and disheveled as if something in him had snapped, taking with it his careful self-control. Keith prepped himself to deliver the killing blow.

“I was wondering if you would take  _ me _ tonight...” It came out much more shyly than he had initially envisioned, but Shiro’s feral thirst had cowed any illusions Keith had entertained of performing the part of sexy, confident tempter. It didn’t matter anyway because Shiro looked like Cupid’s arrow had not struck him so much as violently skewered him through the heart. 

Shiro groaned and reached for the lube. “Baby, you really will be the death of me one of these days.” 

With practiced fingers, he dexterously, patiently opened Keith up, going much slower than he would have on himself as it was clear that Keith had never done this before. Despite Keith’s extensive research, it still came as a slight surprise that the preparatory stretch wasn’t ‘painful’ so much as ‘uncomfortable’: an odd feeling of pressure that easily turned pleasurable when he caught sight of Shiro bare and erect and looking as unmanageably large as always. The thought that Shiro had three thick fingers in him and still needed to add more before Keith was ready to take his true girth made the smaller man’s mouth water and his legs shake.

Shiro’s heated lips roved Keith’s chest, his metal hand running a feather-light touch over his left thigh while the left hand continued the ceaseless stretching. It was the best kind of agony. When Shiro finally lined himself up, Keith’s breath caught in his chest. He had never felt as exposed and vulnerable as he did at this moment, yet there was no hint of fear. He wholeheartedly trusted this man, a man who had killed, with everything and anything. Even Keith’s life, if he asked for it. What was more, Keith _wanted_ _to give it_ to him, give him all of his heart, his body, his very soul. 

Knowing his partner as well as he did, Keith suspected the original plan had been to penetrate him as painstakingly slowly and carefully as he had been stretched. No sooner had Shiro slid the head inside, however, than his hips stuttered and his eyes rolled back with a groan, reflexively sliding deeper in until he seemed to catch himself. His eyes snapped open immediately. For Keith, the stretch was sudden and intense. For a few moments, nothing existed in his mind except the feeling of “full,” and the delicious pleasure-pain sensation that he was being split in half by Shiro’s log.

“Oh god Keith I’m so sorry; are you okay?!” 

Of course he was okay, Keith wanted to say, but it was a bit beyond him to form coherent words at the moment. He was barely even conscious of his own actions just then. Oh, he was moaning. “Yeah,” he finally managed in a husky baritone. And then, “Good.” He was pretty impressed with his eloquence, quite frankly. 

Luckily, Shiro appeared able to read Keith’s blissful mindspace in his countenance, because he looked to be appeased for the time being. “That’s good, because I’m only halfway in.”

Keith stared. 

“Ready?” 

In fact, Keith had no idea what he was supposed to be ready for, so the correct answer was probably “No,” but his mind was currently fixated on the sole, driving thought that he would gladly swim across an ocean of thumbtacks if he could have more of this, more of whatever Shiro was able to give him. He nodded and without missing a beat Shiro slid to the hilt in one smooth thrust. 

It wasn’t possible. Shiro’s initial thrust had filled up all the possible space inside Keith, or so it had felt at the moment. And yet more kept coming, and more, until he was buried fully in Keith and the latter felt  _ impossibly _ full, stretched wetly around the thick girth, legs splayed aside and numb to sensation, Shiro hard and throbbing in depths of which Keith had never before felt conscious. 

At his partner’s next nod, Shiro began driving forward wildly, desperately rutting Keith into the mattress, a frenzied look on his face that suggested higher-order thinking had left the building. Keith felt just as lost to the world of sensation, no energy left to even hold himself up. Fortunately, this was no problem. Shiro’s hands effortlessly held up Keith’s hips, clasping tightly to plow into the smaller man with greater ease of momentum. 

The relentless pace drove Keith higher and higher until he was light-headed and on the cusp despite not yet even touching himself. Shiro held on to his hips with a bruising grip, his mad thrusts shaking Keith’s body like a ragdoll. It was all Keith could do to hold on for the ride, screaming out Shiro’s name as he finally erupted between them, white ribbons painting his chest and some even reaching his hair. Between heavy panting and swearing, a flushed, sweating Shiro gasped out in warning before with a final thrust he crushed Keith’s body to his own, trembling in small, controlled convulsions as he released deep inside his lover’s body, Keith’s name fluttering like a prayer on his lips.

When Shiro eventually pulled out, Keith couldn’t help but feel the absence. He could already tell he would be feeling much more than that tomorrow morning, but far from feeling regret he looked forward to it with almost perverse anticipation. It would be a day-long reminder of his and Shiro’s connection. 

“You’re not going to wear the ring anymore?” Shiro’s sleepy-warm voice pulled Keith out of his reverie.

He looked down at the snowy-white head of hair resting on his chest. “I was just thinking that we need to be more careful. My friends are getting suspicious. Who knows who else may be watching.” 

Shiro nodded, but remained silent. Keith felt the gentle breath of a murmur against his chest. “I love you, Keith.” It wasn’t the first time Shiro had said it, but never had it sounded so soft, like he was confessing to something else altogether. His head lifted to look at Keith. “I love you more than I ever have anyone else, or ever will.” The weight he placed on the last phrase set Keith’s pulse racing. It was surely in his head; Shiro wasn’t actually saying what had suddenly begun playing through Keith’s mind in vivid technicolor... With his trademark sheepish grin, his lover looked down again and finished with, “Although I guess I already gave you a ring long before all of this.”

Keith could hardly hear him through the thundering beat of his heart in his ears. “Shiro, are you saying...?”

The older man answered with a soft, radiant smile. It was quickly buried beneath a flurry of flesh as Keith shot up to engulf Shiro in a tight embrace. Words wouldn’t come, so he settled for nodding vigorously into one scarred, beloved shoulder. 

They stayed like that for some time, exchanging caresses and kisses, conversation flowing easy about everything except what they most wanted to talk about. It was a reality they had both immediately accepted without a single word needing to be exchanged: even the ultimate public celebration of love would have to remain between the two of them only (and  _ maybe  _ Coran), for who could they tell of the marriage between beloved (and definitely probably heterosexual) icon Akira and a man who wasn’t even supposed to exist?

“Hey Shiro?”

“Mm?” The man looked up from where he was reverently cleaning Keith’s body with a warm, damp towel. 

“Ulaz hasn’t announced the next production, and it’s getting close to the wire if we’re to have enough time to rehearse before Lohengrin ends its run. Do you know anything about what the next show will be? Is it another one of yours?”

Shiro’s face grew dark. “No... Zarkon and Haggar apparently aren’t too keen on continuing to humor Coran and his mysterious anonymous composers.”

“What! But Lohengrin’s been a huge success. It’s a full house out there every night!”

“Your managers don’t like what they can’t control. An anonymous composer is a wild card. They know nothing about me, and it kills them,” he ended with a dark chuckle. 

Keith sat up, resolve flooding every fiber of his being. “I promised I would sing your music, didn’t I... Well, I’ve never broken a promise, and I won’t let anyone make me start now.”

Shiro’s eyes grew wide in surprise, but what he saw in Keith’s own violet gaze quickly won him over and his expression melted slowly into a knowing grin.


	10. Chapter 10

Dusk had hardly fallen when the fireworks began, part of a pre-party celebration held for a select group of patrons who were more directly involved in the running of the opera house. Bright blooms of red, green, and gold lit the sky in a near constant stream of cannon-like booming. The main body of revelers were not yet due to arrive but the valet and event staff were already fully set up at the main entrance and the administrative entrance in the back. 

Outside Keith’s dressing room, in the hall, singers, dancers, and musicians ran from room to room, fetching makeup bags, traveling in gaggles tittering the latest gossip, stumbling half-out of stage costume and half-in formal wear. Those ‘lucky’ enough to have been volunteered for the performance group that would provide entertainment for the masquerade ball grudgingly donned their harlequin uniforms and warmed up their voices and instruments. 

Within the room, the star of the ball, Akira, sat before his mirror, applying foundation. A tuxedoed Hunk in a mustard Arlecchino mask stood behind him, weaving small silk flowers into two twining braids that held back the platinum cascade of his hair. Lance, an outrageous ram-horned mask dangling from his neck, sat perched on a stool nearby in an offensively blue suit, occasionally tossing caramel corn into the air over Keith’s head for Hunk to catch with his mouth.

“I swear to god if any of those sticky popcorn bits get in my  _ nice _ wig I’m going to make good on my promise to wipe the sparring mat with your face.” Keith turned from Lance and narrowed his eyes at Hunk’s masked face in the mirror. “Hunk, what are you doing back there? It doesn’t take that long to do two simple braids. You’d better not be doing anything extra like you did for the Hearts Foundation event - I’m already going to look way too girly with the outfit they’re making me wear.”

“Umm, you’re welcome for making you look beautiful for that event, and no I’m not doing anything extra - simply trying to get the plait  _ juuuust _ right.”

Keith risked a glance out of the corner of his eye at Lance to gauge the honesty in the statement. Whenever Hunk was up to his usual tricks, his partner-in-crime was never able to keep a straight face. Lance, however, was distracted. Keith followed his gaze to the corner where Pidge and Allura were helping each other adjust their dress straps. 

Allura wore an airy-blue, floor-length, satin dress that would have been modest in its coverage but for the way it clung revealingly to each curve of her body. The swirling frost patterns of her mask glittered silver in the light as she turned her face this way and that to compare the two straps on Pidge’s shoulders. Pidge -uncharacteristically- was also in a dress, to which Keith narrowed his eyes. It usually took a lot of goading for them to get Pidge to even tame her wild mane in the mornings, much less wear a  _ dress  _ (or ribbons, or jewelry, or anything other than her iconic baggy green jacket and shorts combo). Lance had tried in the past to initiate a “Miss Congeniality” movie-and-makeover night, which had ended terribly... for him. The swelling under his eye took almost a week to go down. 

Yet here she was, in a simple emerald dress (more of a smock, really) which Allura was at the moment attempting to improve by cinching the waist with a tan leather belt. 

“You look nice, Pidge,” Keith called over fondly. “What do you think? Feel like finally letting me do your makeup?”

Pidge scrunched her face. “ _ You? _ ” 

He let mock outrage settle over his expression. “What’s that supposed to mean? I happen to be a  _ professional _ . You know I do all my own makeup for shows.”

“Well, to be fair, Pidge doesn’t need her face to play to the back row,” muttered Hunk. 

“Unhelpful,” Keith muttered back, then in a louder voice called out, “How about it, Katie?” 

Pidge reacted instantly with an eye roll and a heavy sigh, then she pulled on her feathered forest-green mask, made to resemble an owl’s eyes when adjusted over her round glasses. “No thanks; this is plenty for one night,” and she waved at her dress as if it should already be painfully clear what “this” was referring to. 

Allura resettled her back into place with two hands on her slender shoulders. “Stay still Pip, I need to fix your hair.” With gentle fingers, she smoothed hair cream into Pidge’s auburn locks, tenderly twisting them into curls that framed her owl-mask and the rapidly-reddening face beneath it.

“What was that!” Lance jumped up. He had remained unnaturally quiet throughout the conversation until now; it was normally unheard of for him to go three minutes without making himself heard. With a shaking pointer finger and an accusatory glare, he stepped towards Pidge and Allura. “What was that just now?” When he received only blinks, he added, “The... the nickname. Since when do you call Pidge, ‘Pip’?” 

“Huh,” Hunk intoned like Lance had actually made a good point for once, then turned to look at Pidge and Allura as well. 

The two women turned their blank stares to each other, and a funny expression crossed their faces, as if they were quickly sharing a silent exchange that went almost unnoticed due to their masks. It was Allura who resumed first her previous unaffected demeanor. “It’s just a nickname, Lance. It was probably from some inside-joke or conversation Pidge and I had at some point. What does it matter?”

“No, no, no. You’re not one to just go around giving cutesy nicknames to people. You’ve never done that for any of  _ us _ ,” he rejoined, indicating himself, Hunk, and Keith, who hadn’t stopped applying eyeliner but during dips of his brush into the inkwell kept his eyes subtly fixed on the now-fidgety Pidge. 

Allura threw her hands in the air, gaze pointed upwards as if in exasperated supplication. “Maybe it’s a thing girls only do with other girls, Lance. You wouldn’t understand. _I_ certainly wouldn’t know if you boys did or did not use nicknames for each other when it’s just you alone.”

Lance did not appear mollified, but he also didn’t have anything he could say to that, so he sunk with a huff into Keith’s beloved armchair. 

“Moving on: Keith, would you help me with my makeup?” she continued without losing a beat. “Pidge may not wish to avail herself of your expert services, but I shall certainly jump at the offer.” 

Keith smiled simply with a “Sure,” and patted the seat as he slid out. The air in the room was uncomfortable while Keith blended Allura’s eyeshadow. Pidge sat in the corner, looking anywhere but in Lance’s direction. Lance slumped low against the big plushy armchair, arms crossed and pout firmly planted. Hunk bounced nervously between looking at them and looking at Allura, who exuded calm as if nothing had happened. It was a relief when the knock came on the door to call everyone to meet in the Grand Foyer. 

Outside the doors of the Palais, the fireworks continued, now greeting the party’s guests as they made their way inside. A great banner with the words “Bal Masque” hung on either side of the entrance. Colorful suits and gowns milled about on the front steps and sidewalk, chattering groups greeting acquaintances with whom they did not bother to interact during the rest of the year, but whom they could not avoid running into at an event like this. The air was filled with the tone of voice that Keith hated above all others - that tone in which one would say, “Congratulations to us on our new villa in Cortina d’Ampezzo!” One thing Keith had learned during his moonlighting as a global sensation was that regardless of the country or context, there was apparently only one tone that the well-to-do were capable of employing when saying such phrases.

Within the Palais, the Grand Staircase and the surrounding area were adorned with enough lit taper candles to give any fire inspector pause, but which admittedly did much to set the atmosphere. Everywhere one looked, a sea of elaborate masks stared back, cold shadowed eyes contrasting with the high pitch of laughter and music that rang through the great room. 

Positioned along the steps of the Grand Staircase were the performers, led in a choreographed dance by Coran who directed from on high in one of the central indoor balconies overlooking the crowd. The dancers flashed gold-and-silver fans as they turned on the large steps. The result was the illusion of a shimmering wall of color that drew almost all eyes to the performance. All eyes except Lotor, who stood looking ill at ease next to Zarkon and Haggar, unmasked, occasionally casting furtive glances around the room. 

“Remember, boy,” were all the words Zarkon had directed to him so far this evening, and the imposing man did not appear inclined to provide any more for the rest of the night. With a final downcast look, Lotor stepped away, immediately assuming his usual self-assured expression as he made a beeline for an old dowager and struck up a conversation with a sickly-sweet grin.

Across the room, Pidge, Hunk, Allura, and Lance strolled in, talking animatedly with each other until Hunk held up a hand. 

“Uhh, guys? Where’s Keith?” 

They all looked around, surprised. He had been with them just moments ago. None of them had noticed him slip silently away into a side corridor, one of the many skills he had picked up from his phantasmal mentor. From his vantage point around a corner, he watched them scan the crowd for him, quickly shrinking back behind the wall when one of them began to turn in his general direction. 

“Hey,” came a smooth voice right by his ear. 

Keith’s face split in a grin as he turned. “Hey yourself.”

Shiro looked good enough to eat in a princely suit that looked less like a costume and more like it had time-traveled freshly-tailored from the past. It put Keith’s own ruby red suit to shame, though the crimson horror had apparently come from some important designer that Thace and Kolivan had arranged for Akira to promote. Shiro’s outfit consisted of a perfectly-tailored deep-black jacket with golden cords across the chest. It did not escape Keith’s notice that the jacket’s high collar and a pair of white gloves helped to cover every inch of Shiro’s body but his face. White trousers stretched tightly around his heavenly thighs, and impeccably shined knee-high boots rose to meet them. He was going to attract too much attention. 

Keith eventually managed to stop gawking salaciously and look up to meet his lover’s eyes. “I thought the idea was to blend in tonight?” 

“That’s what this is for,” Shiro tapped the black brocade mask that covered half his face from the tip of his nose to just above his brow. 

“I’m surprised you didn’t also dye your hair.” 

“I thought of dyeing it black, like it used to be. But...” Shiro looked wistfully over at the distant party-goers twirling across the dance floor. “I told you about my background. Some out there may recognize me more easily if they saw me with the hair color they knew me to have back then.”

Keith nodded. “Could have gone platinum blond like me,” he teased gently. 

Shiro only smiled and bent down for a quick kiss. “I didn’t want to get stuck with another color. It’s not that I particularly like the color white, but- this is who I am now. At least I finally match my... name,” he said with a hand over Keith’s chest. “You know, in Japanese, Shiro means-” His fingers paused when they felt the bump. 

In response, Keith pulled at the silver chain around his neck, lifting up to reveal the diamond ring glinting in the candlelight against the dark red of his jacket. “Just think of it - a secret engagement. Look, your future husband.” 

His fiance motioned for him to give a twirl and when Keith obliged Shiro let out a low whistle. “Young Shiro wouldn’t have believed me if I told him that in the future he was really going to love the sound of that word. Well, I suppose Young Shiro would have been all the more confused since he hadn’t yet figured out he was gay.” 

Keith giggled and donned his own vermilion mask, something sparkly and slight enough that Akira could be recognizable to the important patrons that attended the masquerade aiming to meet him. It looked more like a pair of fancy spectacles with how little of his face it actually covered. “What ended up clueing you in?” he asked while pulling Shiro out to the dance floor. 

“A little spitfire’s proposal,” he winked. 

“Any more talk of your ex and I’m going to get jealous.” Keith laughed.

They twirled around the other dancers gleefully and just a little too fast for the old-money matriarchs that cast disapproving glances from the sidelines each time Keith and Shiro whirled past them. One may even have stage-whispered something about “homos” with a tut, but the two dancers didn’t care. It was exhilarating to be in each other’s arms and spinning and in love, and for this one moment all seemed right with the world. Perfect. 

Around them, men and women sparkled in a rainbow of colorful masks and skirts, the candlelight glittering whence it was scattered by innumerable precious gems decorating the necks, ears, arms, hair, and fingers of the revelers. From his spot on the balcony, Coran was now directing the choir and orchestra in weaving an exhilarating melody so grandiose that it felt to Keith as if he and Shiro were dancing along the surface of a river of music rather than the cold marble floor of the great hall. 

It was so freeing being able to openly spend time with Shiro outside of dark basements and dusty abandoned corridors that Keith forgot himself, lost in the lights and the sound and Shiro’s warm gaze, and pulled in for a kiss, remembering a second too late that he was currently in public as ‘Akira’ and not just ‘Keith.’ He immediately broke away and looked around. No cameras were going off yet, so maybe no one had seen. 

“They didn’t see,” he heard Shiro utter sotto voce. 

Keith’s snapped back to face his partner, terrified of seeing hurt in those gray eyes but there was only a kind of sad resignation punctuated with a reassuring smile. “I- I’m sorry, Shiro,” he whispered.

Shiro shook his head. “It’s alright, I was keeping an eye out and would have stopped you if anyone was looking. I’m honestly surprised the great Akira isn’t already being mobbed. Maybe your mask is too effective.”

“Har har. This thing is the mask equivalent of a thong. Can’t keep  _ the goods _ covered,” he intoned with only a fraction of the bitterness the thought actually inspired in him.

“Akira!” The shrill screech made them both jump. Lance was striding towards them with all the subtlety of a steam train. In a ceaseless stream he began to grind out through clenched teeth, “Where  _ were _ you? We’ve been looking everywhere! We thought you were taken again by you-know-who ah-” He finally noticed Shiro standing sheepishly by Keith’s side. “Hel- _ lo _ , and who might you be?” 

“S- Sven. This is Sven,” Keith stammered out. 

Lance narrowed his eyes. “Sven,” he repeated skeptically. “Uh, not to be racist or anything,  _ Sven,’ _ but aren’t you a little Asian-looking for such a Scandinavian name?” 

“Lance!” Hunk appeared suddenly behind him, panting softly from the effort of jogging after Lance. “Jesus what are you saying now?” 

“It’s okay,” Shiro replied with a good-natured smile. “Hunk, isn’t it? Kei- ra...  _ Akira  _ was just telling me about you all. It’s a pleasure to meet you. As for my heritage and name, Lance, my family had an adopted great-uncle of whom my parents were very fond.” He quickly shot an amused glance at Keith before looking towards Pidge and Allura arriving. “Sven. Nice to meet you all.”

Keith felt all four pairs of his friends’ eyes burning holes into him as Pidge drawled out, “Sven, eh? I’m Pidge and this is Allura. Nice to meet you too...” She grinned evilly at Keith then pointedly gave Shiro the once-over, lingering over his too-tight pants and the godly biceps that were still plainly discernible even under the thick jacket. “Hope we’re not interrupting anything.”

“Not at all,” Shiro returned evenly, seemingly impervious to her unflagging stare. “In fact, I was just telling Akira that I should really take my leave as I’m sure he has many duties to attend to-”

“No I don’t,” Keith interrupted with a huff, but Shiro continued. 

“-Important businessmen to greet, and the like, and I don’t want to scare everyone away.” 

“I don’t think that should be a concern for you,” Hunk let out in an appreciative tone, eyeballs practically glued to the length of Shiro’s broad shoulders. Keith made a mental note to remind his friends to be less obvious in their future thirsty assessments.

“Thank you, but I really must be going now.” Shiro gave a slight bow and with a final kiss to the back of Keith’s hand disappeared into the waltzing masses. 

Keith craned his neck to see him leave, but already he was nowhere to be seen. When he turned back, four identical knowing grins met him. 

“So... ‘Sven,’ huh?” Lance was first to point out (because of course he was). “Is that fine specimen the reason why you haven’t been waxing poetic on you-know-who lately?” 

Internally, he laughed. In a way, ‘Sven’  _ was _ the reason. “No, I only just met the guy.” 

“An unlikely story, given I saw you two locking lips in a very practiced-looking manner barely ten minutes ago,” said Allura. 

Keith gaped. Damn it. Someone  _ had _ seen. However, judging by the lack of people jostling him, it had only been Allura. “Yes okay maybe we’ve seen each other once or twice before. Happy? And be quiet or someone might hear you; ‘Akira’ needs to be the ideal attainable bachelor, not gay and involved with someone,” he finished in a fierce whisper.

Allura looked like she knew that “once or twice” was a bald-faced lie. Just how enthusiastically had they been smooching? She said nothing more though, and Keith thanked his lucky stars that she, of all his friends, had been the one to catch them in the act. Allura knew discretion. 

Keith tried to quickly extricate himself from the ceaseless interrogation by his friends, who seemed only too eager to throw him into Sven’s arms. (“He had a handsome face.” “It was half-covered with a mask!” “I could tell from the jawline. He had a handsome jawline.”) Knowing how worried they were about what they deemed his ‘obsession’ with the Phantom, he couldn’t exactly blame them. He could, however, evade them. 

He spent the better part of the next two hours making the rounds with Kolivan and Thace, both dressed in plain black suits and white masks, as if they had only just heard that the event was a masquerade, which Keith knew not to be the case. Kolivan was a graying brick wall of a man, tall and solid, with a face that looked like it had never heard of the concept of a smile, much less a laugh. Thace, by comparison, was more naturally expressive. A younger man, he was Keith’s favorite manager. Keith especially loved the way his salt-and-pepper goatee trembled in anger when his charge tested his patience one too many times. Both had been something like father figures for Keith during the many years they had all worked together, parental even in the way they herded him now across the room and instructed him to nicely greet a bunch of strangers about whom Keith couldn’t care less.

After two hours, Keith put his foot down against meeting any more “highbrow pricks” and Thace relented. “Very well; take a break. But meet back here in half an hour. Madame Gounod wishes to extend her congratulations on your latest performance.” 

“Fantastic.” Keith rolled his eyes and made his way to the bottom of the Grand Staircase. He took a quick glance at his watch and a sip from his wine glass, slowly surveying the area as if waiting for something.

Whatever it was he was waiting for, it was not the person that arrived. 

“Congratulations, tonight you don’t look like you walked out of a Hot Topic catalog.”

“James,” Keith sighed more than said as he lifted his gaze from his watch. “ _ You _ look-  _ argh!” _

Griffin was dressed in a cream and gold -but mostly gold- outfit, sparkling from the feathered cap on his head to the gilded straps of his shoes. 

“Jesus, I think you burned my retinas. What’s your costume? The disco ball for the after-party?” 

He never got to hear his response, however, because it was just then that the lights went out. 


	11. Chapter 11

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A little bit of an early release, as tomorrow will be a rough day to find time to upload :)

All lightbulbs, lamps, and electrically-powered light sources extinguished at once, leaving only the thousands of candles to light the great hall. As if on cue, several people screamed. The silence that followed was broken only by the murmurs that swept through the crowd.

Seconds passed. From the darkness, a bellowing voice echoed from all directions at once. “Why so silent, good messieurs? Did you think that I had left you for good?” 

A commotion arose near the top of the right-hand flight of stairs that branched from the Great Staircase. A group of people quickly parted, framing a lone figure in red robes and a mask like a grotesque skull that almost entirely engulfed the person’s face: the Masque of the Red Death. A crimson hood covered their head, leaving only the skull visible, appearing to float in the darkness of the hood’s shadows. With inhuman grace, he began taking measured steps down the long marble staircase. 

Whispers rippled here and there, speculations as to whether this was part of the evening’s entertainment, but their expressions said they didn’t believe that for a second. Some called for security, but the few guards that had been hired for what the city had historically deemed a low-risk charity event were nowhere to be seen. Near one of the side entrances, Allura whispered something to the others and all but Pidge ran out as if looking for someone.

“My apologies for my long absence,” the cold voice rang through the hall, resonating through Keith like electricity. It was thrilling, both familiar and utterly foreign.  _ His _ Shiro’s voice wasn’t like that; his Shiro’s voice was like warm mead, honeyed and intoxicating. And yet, he would recognize this voice anywhere. “I was writing you an opera. Here I bring the finished score:  _ Faust Ascendant _ .” As he said it, he threw a leather-bound tome to the ground at Coran’s feet. With surprise that could have passed for fear to the unknowing eye, Coran’s eyes widened and he ducked to rapidly gather the pages that had slid out. 

“A few notes before rehearsals start, however.” With a flourish, he drew a great sword that had been hanging from the belt across his hip. The crowd gasped and shrank back further. He continued to make his way down the staircase, towards Zarkon and Haggar. “The show  _ will _ proceed as I dictate, lest a disaster beyond your wildest dreams should occur. James Griffin must be taught to act, not his normal trick of strutting around the stage. And we will have no more interruptions from meddlesome managers who can’t accept that their place is in an  _ office _ .” The tip of his sword rested for a moment against Haggar’s neck, and Zarkon practically snarled. The specter did not move, staring Zarkon down until the latter broke sight with a growl. 

“As for the star of our show. The great Akira.” The Phantom turned to Keith, taking the last few steps to where the young singer stood on the ground level. From the corner of his eye, Keith could see Pidge start running towards them, her tiny body struggling in vain to push past the thickly-gathered masses to get to Keith’s side. Their two faces were so close now, Keith could almost make out pale strands falling softly over the gruesome mask, and eyes filled not with the hate that colored his voice but with mirth and something warm and loving. “No doubt he’ll do his best. It’s true, his voice is good, but should he wish to excel he has much still to learn.” Keith wanted to purse his lips and roll his eyes, but instead schooled his face into an excellent facsimile of surprise and fear. “The role I wrote for him is demanding. I expect him to give me everything he’s got.” The eyes beneath the red hood scorched. Keith felt himself burning up from the stare alone and desperately hoped that to their audience it didn’t  _ look  _ as much like thinly veiled flirting as it  _ felt  _ to Keith. “I look forward to seeing what the Amazing Akira can do.” And- was that a wink? He really was going too far; what if someone saw?

The tip of the Phantom’s sword hovered for a moment above Keith’s chest, where both knew the ring lay concealed beneath three layers of clothing. His heart felt a rush of warmth. Keith recognized it for the private moment of affection it was intended to be, but he knew to others it looked like a threat aimed at Akira. After all, it would be safer for Keith if to all external appearances he was merely coveted and not the Phantom’s crippling point of weakness. 

The Phantom returned to the dead center landing of the Grand Staircase, sword sheathed, just as Allura burst in from the side entrance with a group of groggy-looking security guards in tow. Zarkon immediately barked at them to tackle the intruder. Without another word, the Phantom flared the red cape around him. Hissing jets of mist shot out from beneath the antique marble balustrades and from every corner of the great hall. Amidst the chaos and the screams, in a burst of fire and smoke, he disappeared.

~~~

There were no after-parties the night of the masquerade, but by the next morning the entire opera house was alight with theories and speculation. As far as they knew, this was the first time anyone had seen the Phantom, unless Sendak’s wild tales of deadly encounters were to be believed. The favorite topic of conversation at breakfast, lunch, and dinner was what hid beneath the mask. Some hypothesized it was terrible burns. Others, boils. Some of more imaginative disposition posited that it was merely a death-like face with sunken eyes, skin stretched like fine paper over the bones, and a hole where the nose should be. 

Keith took a great deal of delight in listening to all these theories and comparing the ghastly images his coworkers conjured with the devastatingly handsome face he knew was actually behind the mask. It was almost too funny. His only regret was that he couldn’t share his laughter with the rest of Team Voltron. They, too, joined in the baseless speculation with gusto. Hunk and Lance bounced ideas off each other for hours during dinner at their apartment while Pidge and Allura debated the medical plausibility of each suggestion aided by an old anatomy textbook and Google. 

Keith savored these discussions while he could, because they inevitably turned to ‘I-told-you-so’ rants aimed squarely at Keith, though the friends would ardently deny it. 

“It’s not that we’re saying it’s your  _ fault _ or anything, of course, Keith. But did you see the way he aimed that sword straight at your heart? This is why we were worried! He could have run you through right then and there,” Hunk would say, hugging Keith’s head tightly to his wide chest and rubbing his scalp with painful affection. 

When they weren’t trying their hardest not to be smug about the apparent reveal of the Phantom’s true colors, they were ceaselessly grilling Keith about ‘that nice boy Sven,’ until finally Keith had to make up a believable story about Sven being a one-night stand who had to return to his home country. 

The days passed in a flurry of excitement over the Phantom and his opera. To everyone’s surprise, Zarkon and Haggar had quickly agreed that after an extension of  _ Lohengrin _ ’s lucrative run, the company would be staging the Phantom’s opera, though the admission had rendered them permanently incapable of not looking like they had just bitten into a lemon. (In this, too, Keith took great joy.) Due to the nature of the Phantom’s extremely public presentation of his opera, and to avoid having the police involved and consequently their management of the opera house called into question, Zarkon and Haggar were forced not only to produce the show but also to pretend as if the whole masquerade debacle had been an elaborate stunt to announce and promote their new premiere.

The opera was amazing. It had been the fruit of many years of labor, and it showed. Keith liked to think he wasn’t biased in his estimation that this was the kind of life-defining work that became listed as a magnum opus on a composer’s Wikipedia page.

Shiro had first explained the story to Keith while entwined in the bedsheets and each other one morning after a particularly energetic pre-breakfast workout. 

“You know the story of Faust, right?”

Keith leveled a deadeye stare at his lover as if asking,  _ Really? _

But Shiro went on anyway: “The scholar Faust, feeling existentially empty and searching for meaning to his life, is tempted by the demon Mephistopheles and sells his soul in exchange for the promise of satisfaction towards his quest. He then goes on to do... terrible things, including corrupting the innocent Margherita, bringing her to ruin.” 

Keith shifted onto his side, about to make a bawdy joke, but stopped short when he caught sight of Shiro’s eyes, looking slightly unfocused and lost in the distance, as if speaking about something else altogether. He brought one hand up to touch his fingertips to his lover’s stubble, which still grew in dark despite the angelic white hair that crowned him. “What happens to your Faust?”

“I followed Goethe’s plot for my libretto.” Shiro’s eyes lost their faraway haze and snapped back to meet Keith’s, a smile already settling across his features. “After experiencing all that the world has to offer, Mephistopheles attempts to collect on his debt and drag down Faust to the depths of hell, but he is redeemed at the end by the pure love he holds for Margherita.” His gaze softened as it dropped to Keith’s lips. “Even after experiencing all the wonders of the world, Faust finds the greatest meaning in the simple, all-encompassing love he has for her.”

Keith felt his lips part as understanding dawned. Something felt very wrong about the way Shiro described Faust, but he didn’t think empty platitudes would be of any help. He thought quickly. “This better not mean I’m singing a chick again.”

Shiro barked out a loud laugh. Keith had picked the right approach, it seemed. “No, not if you don’t want to. Like the gay stereotype that I am, I wrote the couple’s parts for two tenors,” he winked. 

“Okay... because it kinda sounded like you were implying that I was your muse for ‘Margherita.’”

Tightly-pressed lips told Keith that that was exactly the case, yet Shiro still had the gall to deny it with an unconvincing murmur of “No, no...” He grabbed Keith’s head to bury his face in the inky black bed hair, wrapping both arms around Keith’s shoulders to hold him tightly to his chest. “It’s more like, I just understand Faust’s feelings,” Keith felt warm lips confess to the top of his head. They felt sad, somehow. 

“Right then!” Keith jumped up, pulling Shiro to his feet and dragging him across the subterranean quarters towards the great organ where sheets of music and blank staff paper lay perpetually scattered. “Show me my aria.” 

Shiro chuckled, a bright thing that seemed to make his slate eyes twinkle. “Well, if you choose to play Margherita, this is her theme.” He searched for a moment through the score, shuffling papers until he found the right section, then handed it to Keith to read and follow while Shiro himself played the melody and basic accompaniment from memory, as if he had been playing this tune every day of his life. 

Keith stood rooted to the spot, drinking in the sound. It was a sweet melody -a lullaby-, soft and almost haunting in its nostalgic flavor. Like a warm embrace by two beloved figures from his past. He felt as if he had always known this tune. It was on the tip of his tongue, now. Just a moment more... A memory rose to mind of falling asleep in a pair of strong arms. He opened his mouth to ask Shiro if he had hummed this lullaby to him before, but Shiro had already stopped playing and was placing another few sheets in his arms. 

“...know you don’t want to play the ‘chick,’ as you so elegantly put it,” he was saying. “So if you want to sing Faust, this is the showstopper here.” 

Keith scanned the sheets quickly, brows slowly furrowing as he progressed down the pages and then suddenly rising so high he was sure they were about to disappear into his hairline. “Shiro. What the hell is this. The- the range on this! It... jumps up two octaves in this one part! And then a fast and difficult patter section... and a  _ high F? _ I, I can’t, there’s no way I can sing this!” He put down the soloist sheets and determinedly riffled through the orchestra score. “Plus, the crescendo from the strings in this other section... I can’t project loudly enough over the orchestra in this part.” He felt as if he were rapidly sinking, despair gripping his heart and closing his throat. This was everything he knew he couldn’t do, all the criticisms that had been thrown his way and which deep in his heart he accepted to be true. He stopped short to catch himself in his panic. He hadn’t meant to sound critical of the composition. But when he looked up, Shiro was smiling gently at him. 

“Yes, you can.”

Keith couldn’t stop shaking his head. “I can’t. I- I’m not a  _ real  _ opera singer, Shiro. You know that. And this high F... Pavarotti himself said of the ‘mere’ high Db that it was an inhuman sound that only an animal should make.” 

But Shiro’s sunny smile never wavered. “‘I know that’? What exactly do you say I know? I’m your mentor, am I not? And this is what I know: I  _ know,  _ better than anyone, what you’re capable of.” Stepping forward, he took the papers from Keith and set them aside, gathering up both of Keith’s hands in his own and delivering a kiss to each one. “And I  _ know... _ that you can do this.”

~~~

“ _ WHAT?! Incompetent fool!  _ This is twice now you’ve failed me. Are you not capable of even this much? You’re a disgrace to me and to your mother.” 

Zarkon’s hand flew and sent Lotor sprawling across the frigid marble floor. The young man clutched his cheek and cast frantic eyes up to his father, then his mother, who stood by silently, half-hidden in the shadows of the grand office and of the dark shawl draped over her head like a hood. 

“ _ What exactly did they tell you? _ ” Zarkon hissed. 

“Just that! Something about a Takashi family that was very wealthy and reclusive. That lives in the city. Or maybe that used to live in the city? I- I’m sorry, Father! My French is rus- AARGH!” His face contorted in a horrible cry as his father’s onyx-head cane crushed his knee against the unyielding marble floor. A sickening crunch was heard.

“ _ Don’t you dare make excuses.  _ Did I not warn you not to disappoint me again?” Zarkon turned away and towards the window, his towering figure cutting a sharp silhouette against the gray light of the dawn beyond. Beneath his feet, Lotor’s slender form shivered for a few moments in the chill of his father’s shadow. “James will take lead in the production. Bring him in.” 

Lotor scrambled to his feet and limped towards the door, flinching with every step that shifted weight to the left leg. James was, indeed, waiting outside. He looked awkward. 

“Uh, they said Zarkon and Haggar called for me. Is... is everything okay? I heard shouting.”

Lotor only turned the reddened cheek away from his questioning gaze and nodded to him to step inside. Zarkon did not turn from the window as they came in, arms clasped behind him with an almost military air of authority.

“Griffin. You will take Margherita.” 

“W- what! But, sir, I- With all due respect, auditions are through. Lotor already earned the role.” 

Lotor snapped his head up and stared wide-eyed at James. The latter looked away shyly, but then met his gaze in worried assessment. He lingered on the bruise blooming on Lotor’s cheek, and on the leg he held gingerly raised off the ground.

“Lotor will be unable to perform the role for... health reasons,” Zarkon said coldly as he turned towards James and Lotor, an unnatural gleam in his eyes making the implicit threat unmistakably clear.

James took a step back, suppressing a shiver. When he looked towards Lotor, the normally cocky diva was already hanging his head again in defeat. 

“Is that understood?”

“Y- yes, Monsieur Zarkon.” 

When both Lotor and James had left, the former leaning slightly against James for support, Zarkon and Haggar conferred. 

“I have heard of no such family in our targeted circles. The boy must have heard wrong,” Haggar uttered in her usual scratched whisper. 

“A simpleton. It was a mistake to bring him here. We should have let him rot in that frivolous life he was leading.” 

“He amassed such debt, all that debauchery...” 

“Then he deserved debtors’ prison. He will never amount to more than a witless fop.” He raised one massive hand and began massaging his throbbing temple. “That buffoon’s failure has once again delayed our move against Raoul and Akira. First, that damned opera ghost and his damned opera; now this... I am beginning to suspect divine intervention. Each of our plans comes apart, sometimes the very  _ day _ that we hatch it...” Zarkon stood suddenly. 

“My lord?” 

He said nothing, but walked slowly by the side of his desk, running his fingertips lightly along the side. “Do you remember, Haggar? We once spoke of the coincidence of Akira’s repeated, fortunate evasions of... random tragedy.”

“Yes, of his devoted protector.” 

“But there was something else,” Zarkon’s voice dropped to a roiling growl. He was now carefully inspecting the underside of his desk lamp’s base. “Timing.” 

Haggar stiffened. “Timing,” she repeated, and lunged for the desk phone, smashing it against the wood and pulling a minuscule device from inside the cracked receiver. With a scowl, she crushed the tiny thing in her palm and looked at Zarkon. Sweeping eyes across the room, she intoned lowly, “Raoul.” 

“Call our usual services.”

~~~ 

“Whoa! What the-! Dude, watch it, you’re going to mess up my rig!” 

Pidge was scrambling frantically to gather up her laptop, headset, and various electronics that were unidentifiable to Lance, then dashing to stuff them in her bag. 

Hunk peered up at her from the stack of hay that was meant to decorate the stage for a pastoral scene in  _ Faust _ , and which currently made for a passable napping spot. “Pidge, what’s wrong? You look like you’ve seen a ghost! ... You haven’t seen a ghost, right? Please tell me there’s no such thing as ghosts.”

She took one look at the other crew members milling around them backstage, and raised a finger to her lips. “Follow me,” and she slung her backpack across one small shoulder before taking off. 

Hunk and Lance shared an incredulous look for a split moment before simultaneously jumping to their feet and following her. In what seemed like seconds, all three were bursting through Keith’s dressing room door.

For once, they weren’t greeted with Keith’s unenthused back heaving a sigh and asking, “What is it this time,” in his husky monotone, but with a flushed Keith practically jumping in the air, naked save for the towel he was clutching to his crotch. 

Hunk, Lance, and Pidge stared flatly.

“What were you doing just now, Keithy Cat.” 

He turned, impossibly, even redder. “N- nothing,” he stammered, sliding his phone behind him on the makeup table. 

“Uh-huh. Then why do you look like you’ve been caught  _ in flagrante delicto _ ?” Hunk held a perfect poker-face.

“Y’all just startled me, that’s all! I was in the middle of changin’, you know! And would you  _ shut the goddamn door? _ ” 

“My man, when have you ever been shy about being naked in front of  _ us _ ? We’ve walked in on you changing a million times and your gay ass didn’t even bat an eye.” Lance slowly swung the door shut.

“Nevermind that!” Keith hastily wrapped the towel around his waist, keeping his back to the trio until he was safely behind the Japanese folding screen that had mysteriously appeared in his dressing room a few days ago and which all three knew had definitely not been bought by Keith himself, as the decorative print was of delicate pink cherry blossoms and not glittery skulls or something. “The point is, y’all need to learn to fuckin’  _ knock  _ like the rest of civilized society.”

“ _ Or _ , you could lock your door when you’re jacking it, like the rest of civilized society.” 

“Have you ever noticed his drawl comes out more when he’s flustered?” Lance stage-whispered dramatically to Hunk. 

“Adorable,” Hunk whispered back.

“I hate you people,” came the voice behind the screen. He finally emerged fully dressed, and sank into his armchair. “What do you want.”

Pidge looked around and lowered her voice. “Well, do you remember how I bugged Zarkon and Haggar’s office?” 

Hunk and Lance, not having been privy to this information before, leaned closer. 

“They found them.”


	12. Chapter 12

It was silent in the dressing room while the parties present processed the news. Hunk and Lance seemed on the verge of spewing a thousand questions but stuck on which one to ask first and simply sank against the wall or on a nearby footstool. So it was Keith who spoke. 

“Damn it, Katie! I told you!” He cast himself off the armchair and began pacing, turned on a dime, and whipped around to face her again. “Do they know it was you?” 

“No, they think it was Raoul or his family.”

“The... family? Why?” 

“Ooookay, no, wait, hold up,” Lance interrupted. “Can we rewind five seconds and go back to: what the hell is going on?”

Keith spared him the briefest glance. “Pidge has been listening in on the managers’ office ever since the time they plotted against me. After... Sendak.”

“They’re  _ still _ plotting against you,” muttered Pidge.

“Holy shit,” muttered Hunk. “Isn’t that, like, illegal?” 

“Errm, well, it’s only about a year in jail and a fine, per article 226-1 du code pénal.” Pidge pushed up her glasses with one finger. “But that’s only if you  _ record _ the conversation. I was doing live listening!”

Hunk squinted. “That doesn’t sound right, but I don’t know enough about Parisian law to dispute it.” 

“Anyway! You’re only in trouble if you get caught. And this, as we learned after Sendak, is a life-or-death situation. I’d do it again for Keith, and for any of you if you were in trouble.” 

“Pidge...” Hunk gave her a watery smile, which was ruthlessly pushed out of the way by a brusque, tawny hand as Lance stepped into his space.

“Okay but they found the bug?”

“Bugs,” she corrected. “And like I said, it’s okay. I planned for this eventuality and made sure they couldn’t be traced back to me. Either way, they’re convinced it’s Raoul because of his vast resources and power and bla bla bla,” she waved dismissively. “They figure Raoul must be a huge Akira fan because of that letter he sent them back when they tried to fire Akira, and now they’re trying to get dirt on him and his family in case he tries to interfere again with their evil Keith-killing schemes.” Hunk blanched but Keith simply crossed his arms and continued to look almost bored. 

“Can’t say I approve of the risk you took, but... good work, Pidge.” All three looked at Keith in surprise. He appeared calmer now, as if deep in thought. “Still, that’s quite a jump from ‘wealthy’ to ‘definitely bugged our office.’ Why are they so sure it’s him?”

“Because they’ve been hunting him and think he’s onto them. Oh yeah - I almost forgot! And because they also think -and this is the best part-: they think Raoul hired the Phantom!” She burst out laughing. “Can you imagine what that interview would look like?” 

“An SNL skit,” Lance offered. “‘Yes, hello, and what did you say your qualifications are?’ ‘Well, I had a 4.0 GPA, am fluent in Python and C++, and can kill a man with a rope and my bare hands.’ ‘Welcome aboard!’” 

Pidge laughed harder. Even Keith had to chuckle at the thought of his sweet Shiro as a contract killer.

“They think Raoul’s behind everything because they don’t know about the  _ true  _ reason for Akira’s good luck: the Phantom’s sordid affair with Keith.” 

“ _ Do not  _ call it that.” 

Lance clapped him on the back. “Aw come on, dude. Can’t you take a joke? It’s all over now anyway.” Keith frowned, then turned away and reached for his phone where it still lay on the makeup table. Lance’s shit-eating grin fell. “...Isn’t it, Keith.” 

“Yeah. Ancient history,” Keith replied without looking away from the touchscreen. “Learn anything else, Pidge?”

“Uhh, just that Zarkon is not winning Father of the Year any time soon. I’m pretty sure he injured Lotor somehow, then gave the role of Margherita to James.” 

“What!? Why?” Hunk looked horrified. 

She shrugged. “Something about failing to find out who Raoul really was at the masquerade. He was only able to get from someone the name ‘Takashi,’ but Haggar’s never heard of that fami-”

A sharp crack echoed through the room. They all turned to Keith, whose hands hovered in the air as if they were still holding the cell phone that currently lay at his feet, screen shattered. 

“What was that name, again?” 

“Takashi,” Pidge repeated, watching him warily. 

His eyes had a far-away look, as if he was trying very hard to remember something. “And, what did they say after that?”

“I don’t know, that’s when they found my bugs. What’s going on with you? Do you know that family or something?”

His eyes widened, and he looked down at himself in surprise. “Yes.”

Pidge lunged forward, mouth already opening on a “What-” when Hunk held out an arm to stop her. “Hold on. This is getting to be too much.” He walked to the fridge, brought back two beers, and handed one to Lance. Then he grabbed a packet from beside the normally-untouched microwave in the room, stuck it inside, and sat back down with his beer while the kernels began popping. “Okay, go ahead Keith.” Pidge stared, unamused. 

Keith’s face seemed permanently stuck on the same tip-of-my-tongue expression. “I told y’all that I had a friend when I was little, someone who tutored and supported me. I don’t remember much now -that was around the time my parents died and everything from that time is kind of a blur- but... I remember the name Takashi.” 

“Oh Keith.” Pidge immediately ran over and hugged him tightly. 

“If Raoul is Takashi... does that mean you have a rich childhood friend?!” Lance crowed. 

“It might not be the same Takashi.” 

“Yeah right, how many ‘Takashi’ families could there be in  _ France?” _

“Actually dude, Paris is a pretty multicultural city. I mean, look at  _ us. _ But I agree, it’s too much of a coincidence -it’s gotta be the same guy.” Hunk clapped his hands. “Alright! It’s decided. ‘Operation Reunite Keith with His Wealthy Childhood Sweetheart’ is a-go! I feel like we’re living in one of your K-dramas.” 

Lance spluttered. “I- I do  _ not _ watch K-dramas!” 

“Guys, no-” Keith tried to say, but was drowned out.

“The wall between our bedrooms is super thin, Lance. Trust me, the K-dramas are not my biggest complaint about your viewing habits. On a related note, why aren’t you using those headphones I got you for Christmas?” 

“Seriously-” Keith began again.

“I don’t think the ‘Wealthy’ part plays into it when the protagonist is a global superstar and sex symbol. I propose, ‘Operation Childhood Sweethearts Doki Doki Reunion Special,’” Pidge chimed in. 

“We weren’t childhood sweethea-” 

“Now  _ you’re _ making fun of me too, Pidge?! I don’t watch anime, either!”

“Never said you did, Lance,” Pidge replied with an evil grin. “Why, did you recognize a certain phrase from one of your shoujo titles?” 

“GUYS!” Keith bellowed, then immediately recoiled. He couldn’t afford to yell; he had a show tonight. In a low voice he said, “One: it may not be the same guy. Two: we weren’t childhood sweethearts. Three: we are absolutely NOT doing this... And four: everyone knows you watch that stuff Lance, it’s okay; our estimation of you couldn’t possibly go any lower.” 

Lance roared.

~~~

That night, Keith dreamt of them again for the first time since those first dreadful weeks after returning to the opera house. It was an unusually poignant dream, like a precious memory once lost and now returned with frayed edges and bleached of all its original colors until it was beyond recognition. 

In the dream, Keith ran through the golden halls of the Palais, beneath the crystal chandeliers and their brilliant glow. He was happy, excited, could hardly breathe from this high feeling. His lungs burned with the effort of running, and it made his head swim. At the end of the hall, two familiar figures stood side by side waiting for him. He was almost there, just had to reach out and touch them. He couldn’t wait; he was so proud. And he wasn’t alone. 

“Mom! Dad!-”

Keith awoke to a cold sensation on his cheek. His eyes felt puffy and wet with tears and on his pillow lay a cold puddle where they had been falling for some time. A tired glance at the clock on the wall told him it was five - entirely too early for any decent human to be awake. 

He rubbed his eyes roughly with the back of his hand. He hated these mornings. The morning after. It felt like finding out his parents had died all over again, made so much worse by the brief, intense flash of hope the dreams brought: the hope that he was mistaken, that they had been alive this whole time, that their death was the dream and not his depressing reality for as long as he lived. And he always remembered perfectly the really bad dreams. Like the ones in which he walked in on them sitting at their old kitchen table, the golden light of morning bathing them in a soft glow. “Mom, Dad! They said you were dead. But I knew you weren’t; I knew you couldn’t be,” he would say in those dreams. Then they would laugh and embrace him and pet his head soothingly, and all three would quietly solve a puzzle or something to the smell and music of brewing coffee in the background. And then he would wake up, to life and the truth. Yeah. Those were the worst.

Three hours later, Keith walked in to Allura and Pidge having breakfast together, two of only a handful of people in the nearly-deserted staff room. Recently, it was not unusual to find the pair joining the ranks of the staff-room breakfasters: those odd few that either boarded in the opera house, or were sick enough to enjoy eating breakfast at work, in a beige-wallpapered, fluorescence-lit staff room that had been furnished in the 70s, instead of the comfort of their own home.

“Akira, are you alright?” said Allura, and Pidge instantly looked up from her cereal. 

His hand shot to his face automatically; he thought he had covered up the swelling pretty well with concealer. 

“You did,” Pidge said as if reading his mind. “But after all this time, I know your face like the back of my hand.” She passed him her mug. “Plus, you’re never up this early.” However, she did not ask. 

He stared at the black liquid in Pidge’s mug for a moment, taking in its familial scent. “If you know me so well, then you know I only take my coffee with milk and sugar,” he snarked gently and moved to the counter to make another pot. 

~~~ 

If Keith had thought his slip-up with Lance had gone unnoticed, the misconception was quickly rectified. In the wake of his suspicious moment of hesitation, the gang doubled down on what they had agreed to name ‘Operation Childhood Sweethearts Doki Doki Reunion Special,’ despite the initial grumbling from Lance. They all knew he secretly loved the name. He would eventually go on to claim that he did watch anime, he had always watched anime, and he had never professed otherwise because there was nothing wrong with watching anime.

From what Keith could tell, the “Operation” consisted of making sure that at any given moment of the day, at least one member of Team Voltron tried to subtly interrogate him. Was he meeting with the Phantom again? Had he talked to him recently? Did he still have feelings for him? Keith would always easily deny everything, of course. The hard part was Phase II of Operation CSDDRS, wherein they would constantly push him to finally meet with Raoul, or rather “Takashi”:

“You should reconnect with your childhood friend,” Allura would say. 

“Technically, a meeting with your patron is overdue anyway,” Pidge would say.

“There’s no harm in just meeting the guy,” Hunk would say. 

“Get laid!” said Lance.

But all these efforts, too, Keith resisted. He had no interest in meeting this Raoul/Takashi/what-have-you. They were just little kids when they were friends; he had probably grown up to be a spoiled douchebag like the rest of the upper crust of Paris. Most likely, he was now some successful, greasy CEO - maybe balding or obese, or used cologne, or held a predisposition to sexually harrassing his secretary. It was also possible, he supposed, that this adult Takashi was handsome, perfect, and sweet, and liked Mario Kart, black-haired twinks, and coffee with milk and sugar. And yet, as far as romantic potential was concerned, the thought was repugnant. He had Shiro after all, even if his friends didn’t realize it. Shiro, who could lose all his hair and gain twice his weight, and Keith would merely welcome his own newfound affinity for shiny domes and dad bods.

So he endured the well-intentioned prodding and escaped in his head to remembered moments ironically flipping through bride catalogs while lounging on Shiro’s lap, laughing at Shiro’s stone-faced assertions that Keith would look gorgeous in each wedding gown they saw. 

For Keith, it was like reliving the Lotor days all over again. At least Takashi wasn’t dogging his every step like the pale-blond diva used to do. In contrast to that time, Lotor was downright reserved these days. He still swaggered through the halls like a king and made boastful jokes about his looks and prowess, but the bravado felt like an act. Ever since he had returned to work after falling down the stairs and hurting his knee, the swagger looked forced and the bravado felt empty. 

Despite everything, Keith found himself actually pitying the guy. At times, Keith noticed that Lotor fell oddly silent in the midst of their regular rehearsals for  _ Lohengrin _ , or he would walk into the break room to see Lotor staring blankly at the wall like a broken thing. Lance was of the opinion that it was merely a phase and they should leave him alone, but Keith couldn’t help but feel that human decency called for at least checking on him. 

He had just about made up his mind one day to do something about it and approach Lotor when he turned into a corridor and stopped in his tracks. The very man he had been looking for was standing before him. And so was James Griffin, bracketing Lotor against the wall and speaking in a low tone while looking determinedly up at the red-eyed, distraught face before him. They both quickly looked at Keith in surprise. 

“Oh. Uh, sorry. Didn’t mean to disturb anything.” He had already spun on the spot and was walking away when he stopped again. Lotor was crying. James was crowding him. It was unlikely, but... Keith walked back and looked straight at Lotor, ignoring James. “Do you need any help?” 

Lotor’s face froze in almost comic surprise. After a few seconds of stunned silence, however, his wide eyes seemed to relax in touched gratitude. “Akira... thank you. But no, I’m alright.” Then he turned back to the golden-haired man before him and smiled gently. “James is just helping me with something.” 

Equally uncomfortable with their mutual moment of humanity, Keith nodded stiffly and walked away as fast as he figured was socially acceptable.

~~~

It took one week for Haggar to remember. Now, she glided briskly through the corridors - musicians, housekeeping, administrators, and dancers parting around her as if magically repelled. It suited her just fine. She knew the fearful reputation that had grown around her and Zarkon, and if she cared to she would even have cultivated it. As it was, she saw no need. The rumor mill at the opera company was a fertile enough environment for that fear to thrive with little to no effort on her part. 

She found Zarkon speaking with two investors in the Grand Vestibule, the pale statue of Rameau looming over them as if to join in the discussion. To the two outsiders Haggar’s countenance was stern and unmoving as ever, but Zarkon appeared to be able to mark some deviation from the norm and he quickly took his leave of the suits with a polite bow. 

“My lord.” 

“You have found something,” Zarkon asked as he followed her through one of the surrounding archways. 

“I have found the family Lotor spoke of.” 

“In the city records?”

“In my memory. A tragic fate. Fire.” Her piercing gaze met Zarkon’s. 

“Fire...” he repeated, and subtly observed the empty hall around them. “I do not recall a ‘Takashi’ family meeting such a fate.” 

“Indeed, because ‘Takashi’ was not the family name but the given name of their first-born son and sole surviving heir, now a recluse in the very mansion where the family perished.”

Something like a perverse excitement glinted in the depths of Zarkon’s golden-hazel eyes. “And... the family name?”

Haggar mirrored his slowly creeping grin. “Shirogane.”

~~~

“Shiro?” 

“Mmm?” Shiro put down the practice book he had been flipping through and stretched both arms up, cracking his back. They had been running Keith through guided practice for hours; they could both probably use a break. When his lover didn’t say anything, he got up and turned around to gather the rest of the books from the bench in the corner of the tiny, padded practice room.

“Do you know anything about someone named ‘Takashi’?” Keith finally asked. 

Shiro didn’t turn around, but kept gathering materials as he answered. “What do you mean?” 

“Um, just that. Have you ever heard him mentioned in those upper circles you used to run in? ‘Takashi’ could be either his first name or his last name, or possibly a nickname of some kind.”

When he finally turned around, Shiro’s usual sunny smile was firmly in place. “I should be asking  _ you _ ,” he said, striding towards Keith and pulling him into his arms. “Who is this ‘Takashi’ and should I be worried about why you’re looking for him?” 

Keith laughed as he tried to dodge Shiro’s kisses. “That’s not it. It’s just that Pidge found out from the office bugs that Raoul’s real name is ‘Takashi,’ and I think we may have met before.” 

Shiro stopped trying to attack Keith’s cheeks with his lips and pulled back. “You and Takashi, you mean?” 

“Yeah, who else? I don’t remember a lot from around the time of... you know... the fire that took my parents, but... I remember someone important, who encouraged me to follow music despite the fact that even then I was terrified of living in my parents’ shadow, or not living up to their legacy. And I remember the name ‘Takashi.’”

On Shiro’s face conflicting emotions warred, but Keith didn’t see this, lost in his memory as he was. “Uh, Keith,” he began softly. 

“It’s funny,” Keith was already continuing. “The gang’s convinced that we were childhood sweethearts, even though I keep telling them that’s not the case. I wish I could tell them about  _ us _ ,” Keith sighed in an almost dreamy voice as he rested his forehead on Shiro’s clavicle. “They’re pushing me to meet this ‘Takashi’/‘Raoul’/‘whatever,’ but I figure, what’s the point? We were friends so long ago, that means fuck-all for who we are  _ now _ . Little kids make friends with  _ rocks. _ ” He bugged out his eyes for emphasis and Shiro chuckled. “Yeah, that’s right,” he went on, nodding to himself with growing resolve. “Who cares about some childhood friendship? What does that matter now?”

Shiro was silent. 

“I have  _ you _ .” Keith’s smile was soft and content. This person before him was all that mattered.

The person sighed. “Yeah.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> My grandma and her close friend, a person I considered to be like a grandma, died within a few months of each other. My dad had a close call at around the same time. Thankfully, I haven’t yet lost a parent, but I based Keith’s dreams and experience on my own after these events happened. I hope that something from these passages rings true for those of you who may have experienced loss, and I would be happy if it can possibly help you feel like you’re not alone. <3


	13. Chapter 13

January was the worst month of the year, in Shiro’s opinion. Yuletide was past and all the merrymaking that came with it; all that was left was the bitter chill of winter and cold gray-white skies that reminded him of his colorless hair, colorless spirit. Sometimes he felt like after Ryou’s death and especially after his tour, his entire being lacked whatever unique spark defined a human life. The very last embers of his soul, he would lay down on staff paper. Through his music, they passed out of him and into the audience of the Palais Garnier, fanning new life. That was enough for him; he could live with that. It felt like justice, giving even that last small flame away. 

He pulled the oversized cowl of his dark gray hoodie lower over his scarred features. It was just before dawn, so the streets were relatively empty, but certain businesses were already stirring. He passed by a patisserie where a bleary-eyed baker was making the batter for the days’ confections, and a flower shop with a clearly dedicated owner tidying up his pre-made bouquets. If he had time, Shiro thought, he would love to buy some red chrysanthemums for Keith -or perhaps dahlias would suit him better-, but he was already going to be cutting it close as it was. Instead, he turned down a dark alley and followed the familiar backways towards his family’s old 19th century home on the Boulevard Saint-Germain. 

Every dull step on the icy cobblestone seemed to echo the thudding thought of  _ “empty, empty” _ that was his constant companion. These days, it was easier. The sentiment never fully went away, but like the souvenir tinnitus he brought back from his service tour, it was capable of at least fading into background noise when his life was full of something else. Something like Keith. Keith made it all bearable. Keith, who (unlike Shiro) was such a blazing furnace of life that just being near him warmed Shiro to the point of feeling like his own fire was alive again. Keith truly hadn’t changed in all these years, despite his parents, despite his loneliness, despite fame and glory and all that could change a person. The media had it wrong. It wasn’t Akira who was “Amazing”; it was Keith. 

Shiro dug through his pockets while crossing the last intersection to enter the great courtyard of the mansion through what back in the day used to be the servants’ entrance. Lifting the key to the lock, he shimmied the wrought iron gate in just the right way and gave it a quick ram with his shoulder. It swung open. He really had to get that fixed one of these days, but couldn’t shake the feeling that it could be considered a security feature. And he would definitely be needing to ramp up security all around, if what Keith had said was true. 

He didn’t mind taking the fall for Pidge’s bugs (after all, he  _ had _ been spying on the managers too, even if his method was more... personal), but according to Pidge via Keith, it had only made Zarkon and Haggar all the more determined to find dirt on “Raoul,” and barring that, Shiro reasoned, they might target his supposed employee, the Phantom, or even Akira. Tightening security would not suffice; he would have to keep a closer eye on the two. Especially now that they knew his true name. As did Keith. 

Shiro groaned. That was a different problem altogether. He hadn’t meant to keep his name a secret for so long, but at first he had been thrown off that Keith hadn’t remembered him even after Shiro told him the story of their childhood ‘betrothal,’ and then he didn’t  _ want  _ to tell him, for fear of messing up what they had already built. Even without remembering their childhood connection, Keith had fallen in love with  _ him _ , just as he was, scars and trauma and all. It was more than Shiro had ever dared hope for, and it left him in awe of his angel’s loving heart. He could hardly believe it most days. Now it was too late to confess. It was already a betrayal. And Keith didn’t seem to even care about their past, anyway. Cold metal fingers lightly stroked the plastic toy ring he still wore around his neck. Perhaps the best thing after all was to just forget it, and move on...

“ _ BOCCHAN! THE SHOES!” _

He jumped. 

A graying woman in workout gear was stalking towards him, one finger in the air. He looked down. Traces of mud trailing from the door marked a path straight to his offending sneakers. He slid them off with a guilty grin. 

“Sor-” 

“Look at this! You’ve gotten mud everywhere! I  _ just _ had Shay clean this floor not two hours ago!”

“I’m sorry, Madame Sanda- Wait, two hours...? How long have you been awake?” 

“I can’t believe you already lost the habit. You’ve been away for too long, Bocchan. No discipline! I know this isn’t Japan, but in your parents’ house, we will follow their rules,” she went on, ignoring his question. 

Shiro chuckled as he set the sneakers by the back door. “Haven’t heard that name in a while. Are you going to keep calling me that until I’m 50?”

“Until I die,” she replied sternly, hitting a button on the wall and calling for Shay. “Will you be staying this time?”

Ever to the point, this woman. “I’m afraid not, Madame Sanda. I need to meet with everyone - all hands on deck. Can you get in touch with Matt?” 

Madame Sanda seemed to intuit the purpose at once. She gave a nod and started scrolling on her phone. “I’ll dispatch Rax to reach out to the outer contacts. Someone getting close again?”

“Closer than ever.”

~~~

_ The gleaming halls of the Palais flew by, his feet practically skimming the ground with how fast he was running. He was so close now! The two figures stood at the end of the hall, smiles wide and arms open wider.  _

_ “Mom! Dad!” he cried. He was so excited, so proud. And he was not alone. Beside him, he could hear another pair of shoes echoing where they stepped on the marble floor. _

Keith woke up. 

Again, this dream. He had been having it every night since he first remembered ‘Takashi,’ and was trying very hard not to take it as some sort of divine sign that he should listen to his friends and just meet with the guy already. 

“Finally awake, Sleeping Beauty?” he heard from the kitchen. An annoying-looking face was soon bending over the back of the pastel flower-print couch to peer at him. 

“Hi Lance. I see you got here safely.” 

Lance laughed nervously. “Man, when  _ you  _ say it, it almost sounds like a threat.” 

“Not a threat - post-hoc commentary,” Keith yawned, rubbing his face. “How  _ are  _ the brakes working on your Vespa?”

“Har, har.”

From the kitchen, Hunk emerged with a pot to proclaim dinner was ready. Allura started setting out the dishes. “Thank you for cooking, Hunk.” 

“No problem! It’s not every day you invite us to your apartment.”

Behind him, Lance was dramatically swooning. “It smells like... girl!”

“It’s really a wonder how he remains chronically single...” Pidge sighed.

“Yes, well, now that you mention it Hunk,” Allura sat down and began in her soft accent. “There  _ is _ a reason I’ve invited you all here. I have an announcement to make.” She stopped for a second, suddenly feeling the weight of all four pairs of eyes in the room, and seemed to waver. “But first, let’s eat! It would be a shame to let Hunk’s delicious stew go cold.” 

“It’s less a ‘stew’ than a ‘bisque,’ actually,” said Hunk.

“What’s the difference,” Keith grunted while inelegantly scooping a slopping ladleful into his bowl. 

“If you really wanna know,” Hunk started but was quickly silenced by Pidge’s hand.

“He doesn’t.” 

Keith gestured towards Pidge with his spoon and nodded in agreement. 

Hunk pouted but settled back with his bowl. It was quiet for a while as they ate, but it finally got to be too much for him. “How about we play a guessing game about what the announcement is?”

Lance perked up. 

“No, I don’t think that’s a good idea...” said Allura, but the others were already off. 

“You got promoted to first chair,” offered Hunk, and Allura shook her head. 

“Maybe it has to do with Coran... I got it! Coran bought us all round-trip tickets to the Bahamas!” When that also got a ‘no’ (and questioning looks), Lance elbowed Keith. “Come on dude, don’t be antisocial.” 

Keith rolled his eyes and reluctantly turned to Allura. “Uhh... You’re pregnant.” 

“No,” Allura laughed. 

Hunk held up a spoon like a pointer. “Okay okay wait, we’re going about this the wrong way. How about we try to guess the topic first? Umm... work?” 

She shook her head. 

“Money.” 

No.

“World news.” 

No. 

“Relationships.” 

Allura hesitated, then nodded. 

Lance whooped and clapped his hands, almost falling out of his seat. “Now we’re talkin’! Let’s hear the deets! You got some juicy gossip for us from the grapevine?”

“Oh, is it about Lotor and James?” 

The room fell dead silent as the other four slowly rotated in their chairs to stare at Keith. “What was that, Keith?”

He froze. “So... that’s a no, then...” 

Lance was on him in an instant. “ _ What  _ _ about  _ _ Lotor and James, Keithy Cat? Spill it!” _

“You’re... choking me!” Keith wheezed out, and Lance dropped the collar in his grasp. “I mean, it’s not really for me to tell. I just thought you already knew. And it may not even  _ be  _ anything, really...” The hungry look in his friends’ eyes reminded him of lions stalking their prey in a National Geographic documentary. They were not going to let this go. 

With a sigh, he told them about what he saw in the hall, which set them off for the next half hour discussing the ins and outs of a relationship that Keith tried several times to remind them might not even be a thing. 

“Who cares, dude! This is  _ Lotor. And. James.  _ we are talking about here. The sheer thought that they would ever get together is... just... how the hell did  _ that _ happen?” said Lance.

Keith shrugged. “Don’t know. Don’t care. Just hope it chills both of them out. And it’s none of our business. Why are y’all always so invested in other people’s relationships anyway,” he trailed off in a grumble. 

“‘Cause relationship drama is fun, man. Aaaaand speaking of which,” said Hunk. “Allura, you never told us what your announcement actually was.” 

Allura stared at Hunk, then at Keith, then at Lance with almost fear. “Oh, yes. That.” They waited. She said nothing. Pidge squirmed in her seat. “I... Well, you are all very dear friends and so I find it important to share this with you... We... That is to say, Pidge and I... have entered into a relationship. A- a romantic relationship, that is.” 

Again, silence filled the room. Unlike the previous silence, however, this one felt tense, like water on the verge of boiling. Allura still looked nervous as she surveyed the room. Pidge looked, like her, worried, and reached for Allura’s hand beneath the table. Keith nodded once to himself as if the last, expected piece of a puzzle had fallen into place. Hunk looked gobsmacked. Then he and Allura both turned to Lance. 

Lance was gripping his spoon tightly where it had frozen midway to his mouth. A range of emotions flitted through his face: surprise, confusion, hurt. No one said anything for a moment as they all watched Lance and Lance stared at Allura. 

Keith cleared his throat. “Well, congratulations, you two.” 

“Uh, yeah,” Hunk, still stunned, nodded distractedly.

“...Congratulations,” said Lance, slowly adopting a small smile that was painful for his friends to look at. “That’s great.” 

“Okay! This calls for dessert!” Hunk suddenly stood up, making as much noise as possible as he gathered up the utensils. “Lance, could you help me with the plates?” 

The lanky boy stood as well and started mechanically gathering plates. When both had disappeared behind the kitchen door, Keith instantly looked at Pidge and Allura. Allura looked guilty, and Pidge was holding her slender hand in her own small one, giving it a gentle squeeze. 

“Pidge,” Keith started, but she put a finger to her lips and shot her eyes to the kitchen door. Keith sighed. It had been a while since they had done this. 

_ “You O.K.?”  _ He signed. 

She lifted a spread hand with its thumb to her chest.  _ “I’m fine. We knew this might not be the best way to break the news, but... we were afraid.”  _

Lance and Hunk took a while in the kitchen, but when they emerged it was with eerily cheerful demeanors, and pie. Hunk made polite conversation, asking Pidge and Allura how they got together and when, and they shared the story of their adventures searching for the Phantom’s passageways. Keith tried not to sigh in relief when they said they had only found the one entry. Overall, the rest of the evening went smoothly, until the subject arrived of how long something had been going on between Pidge and Allura. 

The conversation ground to a halt. This was the precipice they were all dreading.

“Why didn’t you tell us,” Lance asked lowly with a tense calm.

Of course, there was no comfortable answer to that and they all knew it. Without waiting for the answer, he got up from the table claiming stomach upset and calling it an early night, grabbed his jacket, and left. The other four sank back in their chairs with a mutual exhalation. The pie went uneaten that night.

~~~

The next day, Keith and Pidge spent mostly holed up in his dressing room, playing video games in the mini seating area and resolutely not talking about the Lance issue. 

“Your brother’s back in town? Gah!” Keith yanked the controller to the side and narrowly avoided crashing his kart into a banana peel. 

“Yeah. Beats me why. He just casually informed me this morning that he was staying with a friend in the city and would be here ‘a while.’ Ha! Suck it!” 

Keith groaned and tossed down the controller. 

“That’s what you get for hitting me with that blue shell earlier.” 

“Can we play something else? It’s impossible to beat you in this.” 

Pidge shrugged and rolled languorously out of her beanbag. “You’re the one who suggested it.” 

“I don’t know how I always forget what a pointless venture it is to try and win against you.” Keith stretched stiffly into a plank on his beanbag. “So where’s he staying.” 

The bushy auburn hair peeking over the fridge door called out, “I don’t know but it must be close by because he asked if he could shadow me every day with the tech work prep for  _ Faust _ .” 

Keith raised an eyebrow as he looked up from pretending to be a diving board. “He considering a career change?” 

“Ha! He wouldn’t be caught dead in the entertainment industry, but it sounds like he might be curious about the technical aspects.  _ Faust _ actually has quite a bit of machinery stuff in the set design: trap doors and pulleys and whatnot, all sorts of goodies to please his little engineer heart. I told him I don’t deal with that side of things, but he said he just wanted to be here to take a look around.” 

“Pfft. Like sister, like brother.” 

“Hey! What’s that supposed to mean?”

~~~

Meanwhile, beneath the extravagance and opulence of the Palais Garnier, two shadows slipped quietly into the thick darkness of the modest chapel. A semi-subterranean relic from a more pious time, the chapel rarely saw foot traffic from those that worked and lived in the opera house. Few of them likely even knew of its existence. Nor was it open to the general public. In short, the tiny, holy place provided the perfect setting for illicit proceedings.

“It is proving difficult, my lord,” the smaller, hooded figure spoke as they crossed the length of the sanctuary. The air trapped here felt musty and close, but neither person seemed to care. “The mansion itself is nigh impenetrable, physically or otherwise. No one has even seen Takashi for many years, outside of the main household staff. And they are known in the surrounding area for being secretive. They keep to themselves, speak to none about their master, and hold no allegiance with external agents. The core staff has worked for the family for generations, or else arrived with the young master and show uncommon loyalty.” She spat the last word out as if it were a curse.

“It would seem our only recourse is the one staff member outside the mansion.”

“The Phantom...” In the corybantic light streaming in from the stained glass windows, Haggar’s countenance twisted into a smile. “We have been blind. Perhaps the answer is staring us in the face. For, if Akira sings, the Phantom is certain to attend.”

Zarkon tightened his grip on the wood of the altar beside them. “Our present failure may reveal itself to be a blessing in disguise. The opera ghost has been allowed the run of the theater for far too long. If we act now, we may be able to kill two songbirds with one stone... Contingent on the brat’s cooperation.” 

“We do not need Akira’s cooperation - merely his presence. The managers... Thace and Kolivan. They care about him. After the kidnapping incident and the bal masque, it should be a simple matter to convince them that the Phantom’s capture is imperative to assuring their charge’s safety. Then, if there were to be an... accident. Perhaps, a malfunction with the set?”

There was only one detail left to resolve. The onyx-head cane twisted pensively in its owner’s massive hand, the tip of it grinding away the ancient wooden dais on which they stood. “Our artistic specter wants us to play his game, but he himself has given us the ace.  _ Faust _ ’s climax is set in hell, is it not?”


	14. Chapter 14

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I tried my best, but I definitely don’t know everything about the cultures and communities my characters inhabit, so please feel free to let me know if there are issues - I always want to learn more!

January was Keith’s least favorite month, he decided. It was cold, it was dreary, it was stuffed back to back with a grueling rehearsal schedule as well as solo practice for the inhumanly difficult aria Shiro had written him, and all month long everyone around him had been acting odd. For one, the time spent with his friends was always strained, ever since that fateful dinner when Lance had stormed out. On the surface, things were cordial, but it was impossible not to notice Lance’s constant disquiet, or the way Allura and Pidge walked on eggshells when he was present. Keith would have loved to escape from the ceaseless angst into Shiro’s arms, but Shiro had been distant for weeks. 

Not emotionally distant, of course. When they were together, he was as loving and attentive as ever, and the time spent apart seemed to be as hard on him as it was on Keith, if the way he ran to his arms and held on in silence each time they met was any indication. Yet he seemed to be constantly busy with something, whether inside the opera house or out. Keith was glad that Shiro was spending more time at his house in the city or perhaps generally enjoying the outside world, but it was lonely.

Lately, his managers seemed to be hiding something, too. He had caught them speaking with the gang one early morning, woken up unexpectedly as he was by yet another of what he had come to think of as “Takashi dreams,” since they had started after the memory jog he received from Pidge. The words “...in that case, it’s better for him not to know” were all he heard before walking in the staff room to sudden silence. His managers’ stoic faces were as placid as ever, but Hunk’s doe eyes immediately gave it away. 

“...I’m guessing you were talking about me,” Keith intoned flatly as he ambled towards the coffeemaker, gathering back long platinum hair strands into a low ponytail. “Is this the planning meeting for the intervention?” 

At that, Allura’s expression sharpened. “As a matter of fact, we  _ were _ just discussing something we’re all worried about, and it is indeed related to your addiction.” 

Keith looked down at his cup. “I’m down to six mugs a day.”

Direct as always, Kolivan stepped forward. “We speak of the Phantom.” 

“Of course you do.” The young singer glared into the sink. 

“Have you been talking to him again, K- Akira?” said Pidge as two of the chorus members passed by in the corridor. “Please, tell us the truth.” 

“Why ask me that, if you don’t believe me when I tell you I haven’t?”

“Then who were you texting when we walked in on you two weeks ago?”

“I- was... on Grindr.” He desperately hoped the heat he felt in his cheeks didn’t show on his face, but his friends’ pitying, disbelieving faces said there was no point hoping. Empty mug still in hand, he had marched out. 

Even Lotor and James were acting strange of late, although in their case it was a change for the better. Whether Keith’s wish for their relationship to ‘chill them out’ had been prophetic, or his gesture in the hallway towards Lotor had touched him in some way, or perhaps for another reason altogether, there was a marked difference in how both interacted with “Akira” these days. Things were far from fraternal, or even comrade-like, but neither Lotor nor James sought him out or bothered him any longer, and in their work relations they were respectful. Lotor, still not entirely recovered from his leg injury, had stepped down as Margherita and been replaced with James. It was unsettling to find himself thinking well of Lotor and James, but Keith supposed he was happy for them in his own way. 

Knowledge of the two’s relationship quickly spread through the company, and for the most part met positively. Occasionally there were the same quiet, snide remarks about sexuality made, as always, but it was heartening to Keith to hear many of his coworkers stick up for the couple. It fed his hope of someday being able to take Shiro’s hand in public, whether as Akira or as himself.

~~~

To a discerning eye, it would be apparent that the grated windows at the foot of the opera house were just the right size for a human to slip through. To any eye, the two humans currently slipping through in the dead of night would have been even more apparent, were it not for the lateness of the hour, and the conveniently damaged streetlamp that would otherwise have cast a spotlight on the precise window they had chosen. 

Once inside, the larger man cast back his hood to reveal a pale head of snowy white hair, and motioned for his companion to follow him. They wove their way through the dark passages of the building’s basement until finally arriving at the sumptuous open quarters of the Phantom’s lair. 

“Shiro,” the smaller man called out, pulling his own hood back from which sprung an unruly auburn mop. “Are you serious right now.”

Shiro had been peeking around the corner before gesturing to the auburn mop to come in. “ _ What?’ _ ”He signed.  _ “He knows his way here. He could have come down to wait for me.” _

_ “Come on. It’s been a whole week. Tell me who it is, already! I want to meet this dream guy of yours. Consider it my payment for all the shit you’re asking me for.’ _ ”

Shiro turned around and took his time fetching a beer and soda water from the open kitchen area, placing the beer before his companion and the water before himself. His friend knew that look.  _ “Don’t kill me...”  _ Shiro began.

In response, the man sat forward and shot an eerily familiar evil grin.  _ “That would depend on the nature of your divulgence,’” _ his half-haughty, half-sarcastic facial expression and overly-ornamental hand movements said. 

_ “It’s someone you know.” _

He burst out in a joyful peal of laughter.  _ “The only other person besides YOU I know in all of Paris is my sister, and you’re about as straight as the Great Wall of- OMG.”  _

_ “Matt, I meant to tell you earlier-” _

_ “It’s KEITH?”  _ His eyes looked about ready to pop out, and he fingerspelled instead of using the name sign he’d given him, as if to drive his point home. 

_ “Oh good, you know his real identity. That will make things easier.” _

_ “Of course I do! After all these years taking care of Pidge, mom and dad practically consider him family, though I don’t think he realizes it...’”  _ He sat in stunned silence for a moment, then voiced, “Wow. You and Keith.”

It took five more beers to catch Matt up to date, but in the end he simply shone a beatific smile towards Shiro and embraced him.  _ “I’m happy for you,”  _ he said. And that was that. 

~~~

_ He ran through the gilded halls, chest overflowing with laughter and... pride. That was why he was rushing; he was going to proudly show them. The two figures stood at the end of the hall, already waiting.  _

_ “Mom! Dad!” He cried as he fell into their arms, just as soft yet strong as he remembered, with the faint aroma of coffee and sugar woven into the fabric of their clothes. _

_ ‘Ah, that’s right,’ he thought. He was not alone; behind him was another person. Even within that hazy, golden reality, he thought, ‘This must be another Takashi dream.’ From beneath the crook of Krolia’s elbow, he peeked behind him.  _

_ But it was not Takashi.  _

_ Shiro stood behind him, 6 feet of muscle, snowy hair shining in the sunlight that glinted off the great chandeliers above, smile shining even brighter. Keith beamed at him. He was so proud. Then he turned to his parents with an expectant smile.  _

_ They laughed and reached up to ruffle Shiro’s white hair. They loved him. Keith knew they would.  _

_ ‘Take good care of our son.’ Their voices sounded warm but distant as a whisper in a tunnel. ‘We’ll leave him in your hands...’ _

Keith awoke, crying and confused. 

The light streaming in from the crack between the velvet curtains was pale and lifeless. Still early, then. He didn’t look at the clock this time when he rolled out of bed and gracelessly stumbled about the room. His hand hovered for a moment above the wig cap on the vanity, but instead he donned a hoodie beneath his black coat and pulled the cowl low as he stepped out through the doors of the opera house. 

It had been snowing the past two days, and the effect in the early hours of the day, when hardly a person was stirring, was paralyzing. The entire world had become a silent fermata, even the air seemed to hang still, making it impossible to breathe.  _ Like a tomb _ , thought Keith as he stared through the window of the taxi. 

The half-hour ride to Père Lachaise he spent in a daze. More than once he wondered if he might not still be dreaming. His phone was buzzing, he registered vaguely, but what did that matter after all. Who called, or where he went. His parents were dead. Burned alive, never coming back. Yet haunting him every night with the promise of reunion, until he could hardly sleep. Great artists stolen in their prime, leaving behind only a small, angry boy who could never hope to touch their legacy. A waste. The dreams were a waste, too. What good were they, false reunions, constantly slipping through his fingers. Reunions were meaningless. What was the point in putting back together something that was already torn apart? Was there a point in reuniting with Takashi, when he couldn’t reunite with his own parents? 

Shiro’s face in the dream came back to him. Why was he the one to appear in that memory? The smile he wore, the ruffled hair, felt like they belonged in the dream, though Shiro himself did not. His parents had asked Shiro to take care of him... His parents had sent him the angel of music...

The cemetery, empty and buried beneath a fresh layer of snow, felt abandoned. Slowly, he made his way to the heart of the cemetery, passing beneath the guardian eyes of the great stone angels that watched over their wards’ tombs. Shiro’s face, his parents, and a tune that was so familiar pulsing through his head with every beat of his heart... Keith stopped at the foot of a memorial wall and brushed the snow off a well-remembered spot in the corner where two names were etched into the black marble. 

“Mom. Dad,” he breathed. Blanketed by the suffocating snow, his words, weak and warbling as they were, seemed to die at the edge of his lips. “I’m sorry I haven’t come in a while... I’m sorry about a lot of things. Mostly, I’m sorry I failed to live up to even the ghost of your memory...” 

Wiping one sleeve over his eyes, he took a shuddering breath. “I’m not you. I don’t belong here, in this world, the... stage and the critics and the... I can’t do this, no matter what Shiro thinks I’m capable of. And Shiro...” He laughed bitterly. “I’ll fail Shiro soon enough too. I said I would give my whole self to Shiro, Mom. But how can I do that when I don’t even know who I am anymore? I sell an image, a persona, my body, even. I might as well actually  _ be  _ Faust, selling my soul for success... s- selling my soul by becoming Akira... and losing Keith in the process.” The tears were flowing freely now, but it felt good to let them fall. He made no move now to dry them. “‘Akira’ is a joke. I created Akira because I was scared... scared that ‘Keith’ wasn’t enough. And I wasn’t. No matter what, I can never be all that you dreamed I could. And dreaming of you won’t help me to. Why can’t the past just die?” His temple was throbbing and his head was spinning. He set his forehead against the cool stone to ground himself. “Right. The past is past... So what’s the point of meeting Takashi now? The little boy he knew is gone. I’m not that boy. And I’m not Akira, either. Not really...” 

He stayed silent for a long time, kneeling on the ground until his legs felt numb from the cold and his fingers stiff where they clutched Shiro’s ring around his neck. “I wish you were here. I wish I could hear your voices again. I’ve been wishing that for a very long time.” Since the fire, when all that was in his world, his parents, his childhood, Takashi, came crashing down. He sniffed sharply and stood up. “But that is a dream, and  _ this _ is all I am.” He tugged at his own natural black locks pensively. “So I guess  _ this _ will have to do.” 

Keith turned around, and locked red, tired eyes with a figure in black. Its dark hood cast a shadow over the visage, rendering the being faceless, like the Angel of Death. Still and watchful, it leaned back against a tree, keeping a respectful distance while the soft breeze blowing towards Keith carried with it the drifting snowflakes and a familiar lullaby. Keith found himself thoughtlessly walking towards the figure, not sure if his swollen eyes were open or closed, just feeling exhausted and drained of all tears and sadness, an existence suspended in time until there was only the gentle humming in his head, and a pair of familiar eyes boring into him. 

The figure drew back its hood to reveal a shock of white hair. 

The spell broke. “Shiro! What-?”

“I’m sorry to intrude,” he uttered lowly. Shiro opened his arms and welcomed him in. “I just wanted to- Keith, you’re freezing! Here, wrap around me under the coat... I was worried when you went missing and didn’t answer your phone.” 

He lifted one eyebrow, but Shiro remained serious. 

“Don’t look at me like that; I have good reason to fuss. I didn’t want to scare you, but... I think Zarkon and Haggar are up to something. And after Sendak... I just... was worried when I couldn’t reach you.” His stern features finally relaxed into a smile as he nodded towards the memorial wall. “Are you ready?” 

Keith froze in place. He looked back towards the memorial, then with a smile, he nodded. “Yeah. I am, now.”

Shiro, however, did not lead them out of the cemetery but motioned for him to stay where he was while Shiro himself walked towards the black marble wall. From this vantage point, Keith could only see him kneel down and place his fingers against Keith’s parents’ names, speaking a few words with a soft look on his face. After a few moments of silence, he stepped back, clapped his hands together, and carried out a succession of three formal bows towards the black stone. When he returned to Keith, a pensive sadness hung on his brow. 

“What did you tell them?” 

“I thanked them... for entrusting me with their son. And promised them I would do everything in my power to make him happy for the rest of our days.” 

Somehow, this was not at all what Keith was expecting. A rush of warmth flooded his cheeks, and he dragged them both away towards the cemetery entrance before Shiro could see. “I’ve been meaning to ask you... that lullaby -Margherita's theme- you’ve hummed it for me before, haven’t you?”

Shiro smiled placidly and nodded. 

“Because I’m your Margherita?”

“Not exactly... It’s really  _ your _ song,” he mused. “I just put it in my opera and gave it to that character.” 

Keith’s eyes widened. “That melody... is for me?”

“It’s always been yours.”

Keith laughed. “You must have tapped into some deep primordial essence of me as a person, because it’s always sounded so familiar to me. Even the first time you hummed it for me, something in me instantly recognized it... like home. Like a very deep-sown memory.” 

Shiro broke into a small, secretive smile, and opened the door to the taxi for him.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Why a Hard of Hearing Matt? Why not? There’s an unfortunate lack of DHH characters in stories, and I have heard many wish they were more common. I also hope to see more representation from these communities in works, so now that I’m writing, I put it in, to be the change I want to see. That being said, I am not part of the Deaf community so please educate me if the reality or interactions between the characters don’t ring true to your experiences! Note: it will be explained why Matt is oral. Also, if some of the scene descriptions sound weird it’s because I was trying to toe the line between not explaining things that would be obvious to those that are familiar with Deaf culture and explaining things that would not be obvious to those unfamiliar with Deaf culture.


	15. Chapter 15

At two weeks until opening night, the entire opera company functioned in a state of constant upheaval. Rehearsals and sectionals ran day and night for the dancers, the orchestra, and the singers. Keith could hardly get a moment’s rest, as Akira had the added pleasure of promoting the upcoming show on the radio, late-night talk shows, and interviews with journalists. All of Paris and even international audiences clamored for more information on the mysterious new production by an unknown composer and the daring advertising campaign at the masquerade ball that had kicked off its announcement. 

Already today, Keith had given two exclusive interviews and attended a photoshoot for the front cover of Opéra Magazine. Now he stood center stage in the Palais auditorium, dead on his feet. 

“James, please,” Director Ulaz was saying. “Can you at least  _ pretend  _ you like Akira? You’re supposed to be in love with Faust, not look like he bedded your wif- spouse.”

James scoffed quietly and returned to his starting position. 

“Okay, once again, from the top of the scene everybody!” 

The dancers and singers moved about the stage, resetting the scene, while the rehearsal pianist resumed playing position.

_ “Ah! Ah! Heinrich. Dear, wretched mortal. Humanity is but this, heavenly and infernal,”  _ sang James as he stepped towards Akira, with arms outstretched.  _ “Come to me, strange Angel. Come to me. Your vow fulfill. He who strives on and lives to strive, can earn redemption still.”  _

Akira mirrored and moved towards him slowly, each measured step projecting both purpose and helplessness.  _ “ _ _ Margherita, would that I were redeemed by my lo- _ _ ” _

Coran rapped his baton smartly upon the music stand. “James my boy, ‘strive’ is up here,” and he leaned over the pianist to strike a key insistently.  _ “Strive! Strive!” _ he sang. “You’re taking it too easy on that  _ glissando _ so you’re not quite getting up there in time.” 

“ _ He who strives on and lives to strive,”  _ James sang. 

“No, no, no.  _ Strive!” _ Coran rebuked, singing the correct pitch.

“It’s not my fault,” James huffed. “What kind of run is that? That note doesn’t make any sense in that chord.”

“Now now, you wouldn’t speak that way in front of the composer, would you?”

“James’ way is better,” Lotor nodded from where he stood, arms crossed, leaning against the great velvet curtains. 

“From the top!” shouted Ulaz again and the pianist groaned. 

Pidge, Allura, Lance, and Hunk, meanwhile, sat in the wings playing Uno and hiding from Lance’s supervisor. 

“God, somehow Lotor and James are  _ more _ insufferable after having found love. Now they’re like a double menace, hovering protectively if anyone so much as aims constructive criticism at their paramour,” Pidge grumbled, softly tossing a card onto the center stack. 

Lance slapped down a reverse card. “Yeah, don’t you just hate it when lovey dovey couples rub their happiness in your face?” he muttered without looking up. 

Pidge glanced at him nervously and quickly looked away, clearly trying to appear as if she meant to look out towards the theater. Suddenly her gaze seemed to focus, as if something in the distance caught her eye. Hunk leaned over and followed her line of sight.

“Uh, isn’t that your brother?”

A familiar bushy auburn mop was walking around the catwalk that hugged the sides of the frescoed cupola above the auditorium, carefully bending down and back up as if inspecting different things, and fiddling with something on the wall that connected to the enormous chain of the great crystal chandelier that hovered on high.

“Yeah. What the hell. He comes all this way saying he wants to come take a look at the production but he hasn’t even taken a tour of the set. He’s just been slinking off to random corners of the opera house when I’m not looking.” She whipped out her phone and typed a quick message, after which the distant figure in the cupola turned around and waved enthusiastically in their direction. “He says he’s ‘studying the fascinating architecture,’” she read off her phone. “Ugh. What a nerd. Hold on, it’s about time he showed his face to you guys. I’ll be right back.” 

In surprisingly little time, she was back with a cheerful-looking young man in tow, hair as uncontrolled as his little sister’s, and sporting an almost identical set of wide-rimmed glasses. It was like looking at a slightly taller, genderbent version of Pidge from an alternate reality. Even their fashion sense was similar. Over his slim frame hung a baggy, army-green jacket and an almost equally baggy pair of sand-colored cargo pants. A handful of pale scars dashed like shooting stars across his face and neck, the largest of which was jagged and ran from his forehead diagonally down before disappearing beneath his shaggy mane.

“Lady and gentlemen, my brother Matt.”

“Hey everyone!” he waved with a smile as he sat down to join the circle where Allura moved over to make room for him. He immediately pulled her in with a warm hug and a wink.

Lance narrowed his eyes. “Wait a minute - I thought Pidge said you were deaf. OW! What the hell, Hunk? What was  _ that  _ for?” He rubbed his side.

Pidge was already signing to Matt, and he turned to face Lance again, smile unperturbed as he cycled through apparently well-trod lines. “Though it was a relatively later development in life, I am... well, hard of hearing, technically. I personally prefer to sign, but still enjoy speaking at times. And I can...  _ try _ to speechread, though it’s pretty hard on the eyes so I’d prefer to just use my little servant-pigeon over here if you guys don’t mind,” he grabbed Pidge’s head and ruffled her hair roughly as she struggled to swat his hands away. 

Hunk appeared to be trying to nudge Lance’s foot with his own, but Lance dodged the movements and continued, undeterred. “Then how’d you-?”

Matt appeared not to need that question interpreted, as he immediately sighed knowingly. He raised his hands, but was distracted when he saw Keith approach the group, platinum strands swaying behind him as he trudged heavily off stage. Behind him, the crowd on stage was dispersing, the performers making to gather their belongings or beelining for the side doors backstage. Matt’s face lit up and he jumped up to tackle the younger man. 

Keith smiled and hugged him back.  _ “Long time no see.”  _ Then, in smaller movements closer to his chest, _ “Careful with the wig!” _

“It would have been less time if he hadn’t spent the last two weeks being an antisocial jackass,” Pidge said, simultaneously signing a bit slower than usual. Lance stared back and forth between them in confusion.

_ “I was spending some quality time with an important friend,”  _ Matt shrugged.

Rehearsal over, they made their way back to Keith’s dressing room, Matt and Keith catching up en route. While Keith shed his wig and makeup and transformed back into his less glamorous self, the gang filled Matt in on every piece of news and gossip around the opera house, Matt reacting with a precisely acceptable amount of surprise. 

“...I mean, the Phantom  _ kidnapped _ Keith for three whole days!” Pidge recounted as the group lounged around the room on beanbags, the rug, the couch, any available surface. 

“It wasn’t even two! And it was  _ not _ a kidnapping,” said Keith as he came out from the attached bathroom, running a towel through his dark hair. 

“Is that so?” Matt voiced with a playful twinkle in his eye. “This phantom character  _ suuure-uh... _ seems to like you, Keith.” He dragged out the words as he looked askance at a wide-eyed Keith staring back with uncertainty. On the couch in front of Keith, Lance, too, stared silently and intently at Matt, as he had been nearly the entire time since Matt had arrived. 

Matt met his gaze and exhaled another deep sigh as he leaned back against his beanbag. “Ok Lance, I’ll tell you. Stop burning a hole in me with your eyes.” For a moment, he closed his eyes as if to recenter himself. Waving to Pidge to get her attention from where she had become engrossed in conversation with Allura, he looked at Lance and began while she interpreted,  _ “I lost my hearing during my time in active duty. I don’t want to get into exactly what happened, and honestly most of the time I don’t even really feel like it was a ‘loss’ at all. It’s opened up new worlds for me. I will say, though, that I’m lucky to have gotten out of that... particular situation with  _ **_only_ ** _ scars, balance issues, and hearing loss. I would have lost more than that had it not been for a very dear friend who saved my life... at great personal cost.”  _ Matt’s eyes were hard as steel as he signed the last phrase, and heavy with meaning as he turned them on Keith. 

Keith had been watching him, lips slightly parted, hurt and understanding painted across his features. In an instant, he whipped his head away, eyes distant, and busied himself about the makeup table with his back to the team.

Lance looked contrite. Hunk looked horrified. 

“Sor-” Lance began but wasn’t able to finish the word. 

“Sorry! I apologize. Lance is an idiot!” Hunk interjected with an arm across Lance’s chest.

But Matt good naturedly waved a hand. “You’re not the first.”

Pidge nodded in tired agreement, then turned to her brother. “Speaking of which, when are you going to actually tell us who this amazing human being is? You know mom and dad have been itching to hug him, kiss him, and possibly adopt him as a second son.” 

_ “He’s a very private person,”  _ Matt signed. After a glance at Keith’s still-turned back, however, he continued out loud. “He’s not yet ready to face the world again. When the time comes -when he’s ready- I’ll tell all of you, and then mom and dad can start getting those adoption papers in order.” 

Keith finally turned around, expression carefully blank, and cleared his throat. “Uh sorry guys, I gotta... go see Kolivan and Thace about a scheduling issue... I’ll be back later,” and was out of the room before finishing his sentence. 

“He’s been acting so strange these days,” Allura mused after him. 

“Man, when is Keith  _ not _ strange? This is why I keep saying, what he needs is to get laid!” 

Matt laughed as Pidge finished interpreting Lance’s statement.  _ “I don’t think the great Akira should have an issue with that, though?” _

“You’d be surprised,” Pidge replied. “He got so caught up in his head with the Phantom; it was unhealthy. What he needs is to get his mind off things. That’s why we’ve been trying to get him to meet Takashi, the patron childhood friend I was telling you about. If he could just get together with him, it would help him keep his mind off that damned Phantom.”

Matt regarded her with a bemused smile. “I see. I’m sure that will work.” 

“To that end, I’ve actually been trying to find out more information about this Takashi ever since I first heard the name, but it’s been surprisingly difficult. He’s for sure got someone with serious chops scrubbing him from the main databases and protecting his data; I’m talking on the level of you or me.” 

“Oh?” Matt hummed. “Well, you know how the upper rungs are - he probably can afford to hire a whole team to take care of his security. What are the chances that it’s a single person?”

“Doesn’t matter either way, ‘cause in the end I finally made headway,” she said with a smirk. Matt’s perennial smile dropped slightly. “First I figured, the guy is loaded, right? Probably old money. All those ‘respectable families’ are the same, plus with what we know about his penchant for throwing money at the Opera Populaire...?  _ Obviously _ , the trick was to go through the internal records of any research or charity foundations that required registering the donor’s legal name, then combing for any outstanding sums of money ‘til I found a match. As I thought, he was there, donating to some organization that gives prosthetics to people who can’t afford them or something sappy like that.” Pidge lazily inspected her nails, looking almost bored. “Real upstanding guy, apparently. Educated, gives to charity, respected veteran, the works. He’s basically a saint. A suitable enough partner for our precious Keithy Cat - of course, I’d settle for nothing less. Anyway, that’s how I was able to find out his full name: Takashi Shirogane. Turns out Takashi’s actually his  _ first  _ name.” 

Matt sat up slowly and let out a soft chuckle. “That’s my little sister, for you. No system is safe... Have you told Keith?”

Pidge scrunched her face. “Matthew Holt, I think Keith knows the name of his  _ own  _ childhood friend - he was the one that recognized it when I first told everyone about the discovery of the bugs. I was just researching for myself, for the sake of Operation CSDDRS, since Keith won’t help us or give us any info himself. Stingy jerk. We’re doing this for  _ him _ , and he refuses to even hear anything about his destined bride.” 

“What we do for friends, eh?” Matt muttered with a wry smile.

~~~

Keith lay in the darkness of his bedroom softly petting Shiro’s cheek, which was still damp from the tears he had tried to hide when Keith finally asked him about what had happened with Matt overseas. Shiro’s crumpled expression when he eventually replied was as if every word was shattered glass coming up through his windpipe. 

“Matt was our resident genius engineer, my best friend and... a sweet dork - about as far from a Green Beret as you could get. It all started with some bad intel. We were... ambushed. Captured. They grabbed Matt first, for questioning. He hadn’t had the training... I knew he wouldn’t last. So I begged them to let me take his place. And they did... but not before roughing him up anyway.” Seemingly without realizing it, Shiro absent-mindedly ran the tips of his fingers along the edges of the gnarled scar that cut across his face. When he realized what he was doing, he self-consciously lowered his hand.

Keith listened, horrified. “Monsters,” he whispered.

“No, Keith,” Shiro replied firmly, but with a softness that had clearly been nurtured through acceptance and understanding. “Just men. In a difficult situation for so long that they had lost the luxury of compassion. When you’ve spent enough time in hell, you forget there is a life outside of Pain: suffering it and inflicting it. That’s just how humans are.”

There was nothing Keith could say. His overall privileged life had afforded no need to wrestle with the kinds of truths Shiro had fought and bled to learn. He simply whispered, “Thank you for telling me” against the side of his lover’s head and held him in silence. When the stiffness at last melted from Shiro’s shoulders, Keith hazarded a lighter tone.

“But geez, you should’ve at least told me about Matt. Not to mention, you know how useful it would’ve been to know you sign, that time we almost got caught behind the curtain?!” 

Shiro laughed softly. “Sorry. I thought it would be easier on you if you didn’t know about Matt, since Pidge doesn’t know about me and I know how much you hate keeping things from her. Plus, it wasn’t really relevant until he came to visit. As for the curtain incident,  _ I  _ didn’t know  _ you  _ signed. Did you learn from him or Pidge?” 

“Not exactly.” Keith turned his face to his bedroom window. Within its frame, the lights of the city shattered the peaceful eternity of the dark night sky. “Just... learned when I was little. After everything with my parents, my therapist thought it might help me express some things that were hard to say out loud.”

Keith laid back amongst the silky sheets, focusing not on the memory of the scratchy sofa of his childhood therapist’s office but on the present feeling of a fluffy head of hair against his bare chest and the sweet, deep-voiced humming that surrounded him, filling the air and his head with a pleasant light. Ever since he had learned that this melody was meant for him, he found himself liking it more and more each day. It was almost enough to make him wish he had chosen to sing Margherita instead of Faust. That, and the solo that even now, days before opening night, was giving him stress nightmares. Shiro asserted in their lessons that he would be ready for opening night, but Keith was not as certain. Never in his professional career had he felt so unprepared for a premiere. The runs weren’t tight, the high notes weren’t consistent. He could practically see the reviews after opening night, decrying the decline of classic opera and tracing it back to the intrusion of impostors such as himself. He hadn’t noticed his muscles steadily tensing until Shiro raised his head sleepily and placed a simple, sweet kiss against his cheek. 

“The solo again? If you’re that stressed about it, I can make a few modifications before Opening.”

“No!” Keith vehemently shook his head. “I- it’s fine. I’ll get it. I’m not going to let you down.” 

Shiro melted into a warm smile and nuzzled against his lover’s neck. “You could never let me down.”  _ Zarkon and Haggar on the other hand,  _ thought Shiro,  _ are a different story. _ They had suddenly decided to order the set design changed to feature real fire during the act set in Hell, and hired extra hands for the stage crew as well as a host of new dancers. They were apparently planning on making the production more of a spectacle. As long as they didn’t interfere with the music and the libretto, Shiro supposed he didn’t mind. All the last-minute changes made him want to keep an ever more watchful eye on the two, but his preparations with Matt and his lessons with Keith were keeping him busier than ever. 

It was times like these he briefly entertained the thought of finally telling Pidge everything and being able to requisition her services. A bitter laugh almost escaped his lips. After all that had happened with the Phantom, she would likely sooner throttle him than help him if she found out who he truly was. He would just have to somehow make time to monitor Zarkon and Haggar. 

He looked up. Keith’s long dark lashes were fluttering as he dozed off, blissful peace on his face. The small diamond ring that he always wore around his neck shone in the dark, its silver light twinkling daintily with each rise of the delicate pale chest. Shiro lifted a beloved, slack hand to his lips. If the horrible duo truly were up to something, and he had no doubt that they were, Shiro would stop them. 

“As many times as it takes,” he whispered against the slender fingers. 

~~~

The remaining days before opening night rushed past in a frenzy for Keith. The entire opera company accelerated their fevered preparations, and with each passing day both his personal managers and his friends looked more and more on edge. It did not help matters that officers from  _ la PP _ could be seen night and day stalking the halls of the opera house, or talking with Zarkon and Haggar. When pressed, the Opera Populaire’s managers claimed they were collaborating with Paris police to increase security around opening night. The whispers around the company wondered whether the Phantom would make another spectacular appearance, though so far he had never yet interrupted a performance. It was somehow understood by all that for their patron specter, the art itself was apparently sacrosanct. 

None of it sat right with Keith. Neither the tightened security nor his close circle’s inexplicable anxiety. Not to mention that the gang had begun constantly grilling him about the Phantom again, and it killed Keith to have to deny any feelings for Shiro when all he wanted was to shout it from the rooftops. 

Then there were the contracted dancers. Zarkon and Haggar had suddenly decided to hire outside help, but must have gone to the worst dance school in the country to do so. Many were borderline incompetent, and some looked more like linebackers than dancers. The number of times they had nearly bowled Keith over during rehearsal was getting to the double digits. 

Unknown to Keith, his friends were struggling, too. 

“Guys, I’m just saying I’m not sure. Is this really the right thing to do?” Hunk said a few nights before the premiere. For once, they gathered not in Keith’s dressing room but at Hunk and Lance’s apartment, strictly sans Keith. “Keith  _ loves _ him.” 

“Keith  _ used _ to love him,” Allura replied from their beat-up faux-leather couch. “He himself said he hasn’t even seen him since the masquerade.” 

“Yeah but, I think we all know that’s gotta be bullshit,” said Lance. “It’s that sappy look he gets in his eyes. It’s all,” he waved a hand ambiguously through the air,  _ “happy.”  _

Allura didn’t quite meet Lance’s eyes, but she softened her fire before responding. “Either way, we must do this. Even if Keith loves him. Even if he mopes and sulks for the next five years. The Phantom is a killer. He’s simply too dangerous to be left to roam free.” 

“Okay, but this is dangerous, too. Are we really willing to use our friend as bait? Without his consent or even knowledge? Keith will never forgive us when he finds out!” Hunk wrung his hands.

“ _ If _ he finds out,” Pidge spoke up from beside Allura, giving her hand a tight squeeze. “As long as everything goes according to plan, Keith need not even know that the police captured his beloved Phantom during his performance. So play it cool before he begins to suspect something. Remember, Kolivan and Thace were the ones to come to us with this idea, and they’d rather die than let something happen to Keith. If they think it’s worth it to try and trap the Phantom, then it’s worth it.”

Hunk released a hefty sigh. “Poor Keith. Twisted every way, without any choice or control, forced to betray the person he loves, and he doesn’t even know it.”

The team hung their heads in silence. Pidge buried her face against Allura’s arm.

Finally, Allura broke the tension. “I know. I feel it, too. Don’t think that I don’t care... But every hope and prayer rests on him now.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> “He who strives on and lives to strive, can earn redemption still.” From Part II, Act V of Goethe’s play, _Faust._


	16. Chapter 16

The opera house was at full capacity. Seats to the first night of  _ Faust Ascendant _ had sold out weeks ago, as well as for every show night that followed for the next two weeks. Media vans had been parked outside the opera gates since the early afternoon, ready to document what was sure to be a resounding success or a spectacular failure. It seemed as if the world at large quivered with anticipation: the Amazing Akira and the Opera Populaire’s great mystery opus. For the venerated opera house, the last few months had seen the disappearance (and sudden return) of Akira, murder, and a bombastic reveal of a show and a composer no one had ever heard of; it all converged on this opening night. 

Within the rich wooden doors of the Palais, the electricity running through the crowd in the seats was palpable, even to the performers waiting backstage. Every member of the orchestra, the ballet, and the chorus held themselves with bated breath, enervated by their own unease and the audience’s excitement. Would the Phantom attend his own show’s opening? Would there be another death? The expectant faces of the golden figures sculpted into the walls of the auditorium lay in wait to bear witness to the coming spectacle.

Keith was no exception to the quiet chaos. In the wings, behind a crimson side leg curtain, he paced back and forth, the glossy platinum wig shimmering in the light coming from the stage and from the great crystal chandelier that hung, timeless, above tonight’s audience as it had for a century and a half of audiences, shows, and music. Sleepless and shaking with nerves, he had sought out Shiro last night, but for the second time since Keith had come to know him, the man had proved as ephemeral as his supernatural moniker. He would not answer his phone. He was not in his underground quarters. Nor could Keith reach Matt, whom he now knew had been spending time with Shiro since the bespectacled terror had arrived in Paris. Pulling out his phone from a pocket in his Scholar Faust costume, he shot off another text to Shiro and with a sigh powered down the device.

In the box directly across from the perennially empty Box 5, Zarkon and Haggar sat grim as stones. Their eyes alone betrayed their internal calculations, as they swept continuously over the audience in their seats, to the police inconspicuously stationed at every exit from the theater, to the offending emptiness of Box 5 on the other side of the stage, to the private security agents they had hired -milling about in the shadows dressed all in black and sporting equally dark expressions. Behind Zarkon and Haggar sat Lotor in reserved silence.

When the lights finally diminished, a pregnant hush fell across the auditorium, one slow, silent breath. Below, in the orchestra pit, Coran raised his arms in a magnificent arc. Hunk raised his bow to his bass. Allura raised her flute to her lips. With a grandiose chord, the overture took off. The curtains opened. Keith stepped out of the darkness of the wings, and Akira stepped into the blazing gold of the spotlights. The opera began.

The audience was stunned. The music was raw, wild. It seized your throat and rattled your mind, until you no longer knew what could possibly come next, eyes wide and flying about the stage where the melody vibrated through shining Akira like a note through a guitar string, like electricity through a wire, like the word of Apollo through his oracle. Then, when it had lit your nerves and mind aflame, it wrapped you up in a delicate touch as soft as a lullaby, or a love song. At times, it threw you to the depths of despair, the string section weaving a dark melody that sung of hopelessness and solitude, black, sticky, anguished tendrils that clung to your heart until you felt like nothing would ever make them leave again. Above all, it made you feel  _ alive _ .

This opera was like nothing the people of Paris had seen or heard. It was magnificent. 

By the end of the penultimate act, Keith was sweating with exertion and nerves. He was reminded of a similar opening night so many months ago, the feeling of leaving it all on the stage and holding nothing back. He had been truly giving his best performance so far tonight, but he still had more to go. The last act contained that damned aria. 

While the audience took time for intermission, he turned on his phone again. Eyes closed, holding a water bottle to his forehead to cool off, he heard the continuous pinging of old texts coming through and looked down to see a string of responses from Shiro. He gripped the phone tighter and read, 

_ “Hey, sorry. I was investigating something regarding the you-know-whos - I think you should be careful. Have you started yet?” _

_ “Keith, where are you now?” _

_ “Keith I needto talk to u”  _

_ “dont get on stage”  _

Then finally,  _ “im coming.”  _

Keith furrowed his brow and looked around. Shiro had never before tried to talk to him in the middle of a show; whatever this was about, it sounded serious. Nevertheless, he was immediately prevented from replying as the sound poured in of the audience re-entering the theater. He peeked between the curtains to survey their excited faces. He couldn’t just abandon a show right before the finale. There wasn’t even an understudy to replace him. With one final frown at his phone, he powered off again, tucked it in his personal bag backstage, and prepared to face the final act.

The final act was an experience. At the Opera managers’ insistence, live fire was being used in the many black torches that flanked the stage, as well as in a great pit that opened in the middle, towards which the character of Faust was supposed to advance, as if being pulled into hell itself. It made Keith more than a little anxious, and also made him wonder whether Zarkon and Haggar would stoop to paying off the fire inspector for the sake of putting on a good show. He figured they definitely would not have, especially for a show they had been essentially strong-armed into producing, so the live fire setup must have satisfied code restrictions. He nevertheless completed his breathing exercises and tried to purge all thoughts of dead parents from his mind before stepping out into his final scene with only a minimal amount of trembling. 

Lights dimmed, the orchestra started up. The music swelled into a crest as the curtains parted once again and Akira entered the scene. This was the climax of the story, where Faust descended into hell, cursed as he was, and dragged ever towards his eternal damnation by the weight of his guilt. Akira moved ethereally across the stage, recounting his many regrets and the evils of his actions with a contradictingly angelic voice. Somewhere backstage, he thought he heard a muted thud.

From the corner of his eye, Keith could see Lance watching from the wings and Pidge in the front row giving him a thumbs up, though it was hard to make out anything beyond the first row in the glare of the lights aimed towards him. From between the layers of velvet curtains that lined the sides of the stage, Zarkon and Haggar’s outsourced dancers emerged, dressed as various devils and demons that began to close ranks around Faust the closer he came to the yawning, fiery chasm center stage. 

The berobed figure of Faust looked out upon the crowd and cried out with a piercing note. Then, clutching the fabric at his chest, he rent it in two, the gauzy weave sliding softly down one bare shoulder as his voice slid down a decrescendo. Real tears crowned his lashes. He wrung out his heart on stage, throwing into the performance every true force of feeling he could muster. The pain of loss, the pain of a loved one’s suffering, the pain of separation. With a dejected slump, Keith dropped his head and grabbed his silver locks in theatrical despair. Any moment now, James would enter behind him to sing his solo as Margherita calling Faust back to save him from the brink of damnation, then it would be time to face that inhumanly difficult aria. All thoughts of the aria vanished, however, when the voice floated towards him. 

That wasn’t James. 

World-class acting pretense forgotten, Keith’s head whipped around in shock to see Shiro behind him on the other side of the stage, 6 feet of devilish handsomeness standing tall before the entire audience and what might as well have been the entire world. He wore Margherita’s costume, the immaculate white robes glowing as they reflected the light from the pit’s flames. Between those and the diaphanous veil he wore to obscure his features, he looked like a beautiful infernal angel descended from the skies to grace the world of men.

Keith was struck dumb.  _ Oh right, my line. _ “M- Margherita,” he managed to sing on a quivering note. 

In his periphery, he could see Coran recover from his own shock quickly enough to bring the orchestra back in at the correct cue. There was a quiet blur of movement in the wings but none dared interrupt the scene. Shiro stepped gently forward singing Margherita’s part flawlessly, the notes so much sweeter in his voice, the words so much sweeter on his lips, than they had ever sounded on James’. Whether from surprise or from the heat coming from the raging fire pit before him, or perhaps from the dreamlike bind Shiro perpetually held on him, Keith stood rooted to the spot, mind heavy and eyelids softly closing as he let his lover’s tender, velvet tones wash over him. 

Unnoticed by Keith in his reverie, the dancing demons closed ever tighter in formation around him, much closer than they had rehearsed, as he resumed his gallows-march to the infernal chasm. In the box above, Zarkon tightened his grip on his onyx-head cane and on the arm of his seat until the wood nearly splintered beneath his claws. Beside him, Haggar sat as still as the cold, winged figures carved into the gilded walls of the auditorium. The orchestra strings swelled in a feverish crescendo, staccato shrieks of the bowstrings punctuating the air in erratic fashion as the dancers leaped in the air and ever nearer to Keith. 

Keith sang and dragged himself automatically towards the fire as the scene called for, not realizing until it was too late that the formation -and he along with it- had now moved so near the pit as to almost be at its lip. The rehearsals for this scene had not had them positioned quite so close to the flames; he could feel their blazing heat tickling his skin as he sang, an unpleasant sensation crawling up his spine that he tried to dismiss as simply his irrational phobia rising up again. It was just like these dancers, Keith thought, to completely botch their blocking during a live show - they were even messing up the choreography. Their movements were less controlled than usual, wild, some of the demons nearly tumbling into Keith during their spins. Behind Keith, an unseen dancer spiralled across the stage, trajectory deadset for Keith, the gaping inferno lying beyond. Faster he spun, and faster, arms akimbo, legs blurring. Faster. Faster. Keith didn’t see. He wouldn’t see in time. He was going to fall. 

A voice rang out across the stage, carrying out over the audience, over even the deafening roar of the orchestral score. 

“Faust!” 

It made Keith turn in surprise. Shiro had not sung but rather yelled out to him, voice as frenetic and desperate as the expression Keith now saw on his beloved’s face. Keith’s last-minute turn cleared the path between the spinning dancer and the fire, and the former barely managed to stop his own momentum in time, awkwardly stumbling to avoid falling alone headfirst into the flames. 

“Faust,” Shiro called out again, firmly this time, eyes suddenly set in a dark, blazing determination that demanded- no,  _ claimed  _ Keith’s complete and utter attention. “ _ Come to me _ ,” he sang, and his gaze scorched a fiery path straight to Keith’s soul such that it did not even register that Shiro was still singing Margherita’s lines and continuing the scene.  _ “Come to me...” _

Keith’s body obeyed Shiro’s voice automatically. His feet carried him towards Shiro and away from the flames and the hellish dancers as if something within him was helplessly, eternally, magnetically drawn to something within Shiro. The dancers darted to and fro around Keith but did not dare now disturb his steady advance to Shiro’s outstretched arms. 

All throughout, Shiro kept singing Margherita’s -Keith’s- lullaby, softly now, the orchestra’s harmonious chords cradling the dulcet notes, but Shiro’s eyes remained burning and steadfast on Keith’s own as he determinedly pulled the younger man in with his voice. Keith was lost in the familiar melody, his melody. Shiro’s all-consuming love for Keith ardently woven into song form. It was as if he could hear Shiro inside his head rather than in the outside world. In fact,  _ everything  _ in the outside world had disappeared except for the liquid mercury of Shiro’s irises. Keith couldn’t even bring himself to care that he had moved from his stage position entirely too early. Shiro was calling to him; he had to go. 

Keith had almost reached him when Shiro ended his song. The thrall he held over Keith was momentarily suspended as the orchestra continued by the book and the world at large came rushing back to Keith’s senses. All at once he took in his position -arms outstretched towards Shiro-, the sight of a creeping movement in the darkness of the audience seats, Coran’s bewildered face as he continued to lead the opera whilst trying to catch Keith’s eye to make sure he was alert enough for his upcoming solo, and the continuing bustle in the wings that he now realized were police officers silently filing in but staying just outside the stage lights, eyes trained directly on an unsuspecting Shiro. 

What were they planning? Keith’s heart hammered in his chest as he watched the spotlight gradually leave Shiro’s figure to alight on his own. Almost simultaneously, the officers made to follow the retreating light and reach towards Shiro in the darkness. Without a second thought, Keith ran the last few paces to Shiro’s side, the spotlight wavering slightly as if startled, then following to wrap them in the safety of its light. Keith made a mental note to apologize to the Light team afterwards. 

The orchestra swelled once more, giving Akira the cue for his aria. With a tug that he hoped looked like part of the script, Keith spun Shiro around to his other side so that he stood between Shiro and  _ la PP _ in the wings. He took a deep breath, and began his aria. 

It started low, sweet and haunting, the anthem of a scared sinner who did not dare to hope for salvation. As he sang, he crossed the stage emotively, pulling a confused-looking Shiro in tow. He had meant to create more distance between him and the police officers hiding stage right, but when he reached the other side he spotted Pidge, Lance, Kolivan, and Thace in the wings stage left, in ready stances and also staring daggers at Shiro. He instantly whirled Shiro back around to his other side, masking the action as part of the script by timing it together with a particularly florid vocal passage and marking it with a stomp for emphasis. 

There was no way out. Those in the wings, and now also the private security that Zarkon and Haggar had hired, were still advancing in the darkness. All their eyes were on Shiro. Unless...

Keith closed his eyes, breathing in deeply through his measures of rest and planting himself firmly in the center of the stage. Behind him, Shiro’s hand knowingly gave his a reassuring squeeze, then let go. Keith opened his eyes, and breathed in. 

The note rang clear across the hall, hung for a moment in the air, and slid gracefully into an elegant run, flawlessly executed. The small movement all over the auditorium and in the wings ceased. Akira’s voice seemed slightly different somehow - still sweet, still angelic, but slightly husky and raw, a realness to it that hadn’t been there before. Disciplined control was perfectly balanced with a sound as free and full of life as a gust of mountain breeze. This wasn’t Akira anymore; it was all Keith. He tiptoed through a technical minefield of staccato, suddenly and cleanly jumping up two octaves into a lilting run that had the audience holding their collective breath until he resolved it, voice growing in volume and resonating even above the crescendo of the full orchestra. No eyes were on Shiro anymore; they were all fixed on Keith as if they were physically incapable of looking away. 

He did not feel feverish, or dizzy. This was not the out-of-body experience he felt the night he first met Shiro in person. His head was clear, his body present. He felt utterly grounded and connected to his surroundings. He felt... at peace, master of his art. The doubts that had plagued him fizzled away before the growing realization that he  _ could _ do this, because he  _ was _ doing it. He belonged. And this was his domain. 

A fiery grin spread across his features as he stepped forward, brazen confidence shining through as if it alone could inflame the hearts of his captive audience. The faces in the wings and in the darkness of the auditorium all around were turned to him, open and waiting. They revolved around him, planets orbiting their beloved star, and he was going to pull them all in. The music surged suddenly, then instantly dropped as Keith took a final breath and attacked the cadenza with all the fervor of his own sense of self-worth. He knew who he was. This was him, all of him: his heart, his soul, his voice, poured into the notes that steadily climbed, and climbed, until with a final breath, he sliced through the high F, clear as ice crystals, and sent it ringing through the ancient theater, a prayer to the temple of music.

After a beat of reverberating silence, the orchestra started back up into the finale, but the audience was already erupting in rapturous uproar. It was as if Keith had severed their binds. They rose as a wave, movement coming from all sides - including the wings. 

He had not foreseen this. The chaos that was quickly evolving was the perfect setting to capture Shiro, even as he stood on stage. He whirled around to grab Shiro, but it seemed Shiro had taken the distraction Keith’s aria had provided, as an opportunity to fiddle with something near the fire pit. He was bent over it now, pulling a final lever to douse the flames. 

The orchestra finished. Keith thought quickly, eyes darting desperately between Shiro, the audience, and the would-be captors that surrounded them. With a loud whistle, he waved to the Light team. They immediately trained the main spotlight on him. A hush fell over the crowd once again as Keith raised his voice and spoke directly to his audience for the first time. 

“Everyone! Can I have your attention, please. Sorry, normally I would be bowing up here and asking my fellow performers to do the same, but... I have something to say.” He took a rattling breath in. Behind him, the police and his friends continued to sneak towards Shiro. “I’m tired of hiding. I want you all to know the real me, the flawed, very  _ human  _ person behind ‘the Amazing Akira.’” Fingers trembling, he slowly pulled off his wig, his natural ebony locks spilling out like a dirty secret. The crowd erupted again, this time in gasps and mutters. “So I’d like you all to come join me on stage,” he called out, almost shouting to be heard above the ruckus. “First 100 audience members to get up here  _ right now _ get free season passes and Behind-the-Stage time with me!” 

The words were barely out of his mouth but the audience was already rushing the stage like an angry mob, practically trampling over Zarkon and Haggar’s security guards who were trying to climb up near the orchestra pit to grab Shiro. The officers near them shrank back at the onslaught of the masses. Keith managed a momentary smirk at how well the plan had worked before it quickly turned into a frown when he faced a stampeding throng. A strong metal arm wrapped around his waist, and he turned to see Shiro looking up and out across the auditorium, curving his spread hand up in an arc-like gesture while pulling both himself and Keith back towards the now-flameless pit. 

The last thing Keith saw was the great crystal chandelier groaning, creaking, then swiftly plummeting down in a glittering deadly shower towards the deserted audience seats that Keith’s offer had just emptied. Then he was falling backwards, plummeting down through the hole of the fire pit. The mouth of the pit closed above them, casting the two in shadow as they fell and instantaneously blocking out the panicked screams echoing through the opera house.


	17. Chapter 17

Keith was falling, falling. He felt his body instinctively brace itself despite the reassuring metal arm that continued to hold him securely against Shiro’s chest. The other, flesh hand came up to hold the back of his head. When the shock came, it was more of a sudden deceleration, as both Shiro’s body and the pillowy material they had fallen onto cushioned the blow. 

“Are you alright, Keith?!” Shiro was saying while attempting to extricate both of them from the enveloping mass of the humongous air-cushion. Keith recognized it from a previous show, where the opera company had used it in combination with smoke and a trapdoor in the stage floor to simulate a character’s magical disappearance. 

Adrenaline pulsed like lightning through his veins. “F- fine,” he replied when he had recovered enough to talk, watching as Shiro cast off Margherita’s veil and the flowing white robes to reveal the shirt and pants he was wearing beneath. For once, Keith noted, he wore short sleeves, laying bare the gruesome latticework of pale scars that decorated his flesh arm down to the knuckles. Beautiful, as ever. His gloves were off. His mask was off. His fluffy white strands lay in utter disarray. He looked as if he had run to Keith’s side at a moment’s notice, without regard for the ineradicable cloth armor he always took great pains to don before leaving his home. 

Keith looked down at his own half-naked body, the tattered costume still slipping off from when he had torn it on stage. He tied off the loose half so it hung about his waist. Just in case he had the need for maximum mobility. “What happened?”

They were off the cushion and Shiro was already rapidly pulling him down a dark hallway into a familiar set of passages. They were headed to his underground quarters. “I had to get you away from there. Matt and I discovered Zarkon and Haggar’s plan - and not a second too soon, it seems. I should’ve known when they insisted on changing the set design...” he trailed off in a murmur.

Slightly more present now, Keith realized he was trembling. “What are you talking about? What was their plan?” 

Shiro glanced back for a moment, but did not slow their pace through the damp tunnels. With a subdued voice, at length he spoke. “The live fire in the pit was put there for a reason. As was the hiring of external contractors to supplement our ballet company. They were going to pass it off as a tragic accident, an athletic slip-up during the performance, and Akira’s career ended forever... or worse.” The mechanical hand holding Keith’s own tightened to an almost painful degree. 

Keith stopped dead in his tracks. The jolt through their joined hands almost tripped Shiro, and he turned to the younger man with wary eyes. “They... were going to... kill me? B- burn me?” Keith’s eyes were open but unseeing. Unbidden, images of closed caskets and charred violins bubbled up to the surface of his mind almost as quickly as he tried to strike them down. 

“Breathe, baby. It’s okay now. I’m here. I’m not going to let anything happen to you,” Shiro muttered, worried eyes locked onto Keith’s blank ones and firm hands cradling the sides of the singer’s delicate, and much paler than usual, face. “Can you hear me? Just tell me that.”

He nodded dumbly. The initial panic had subsided somewhat, and now he just felt muddled, detached. He tried to say something, tell Shiro he was okay, anything. But a familiar feeling seized him; his throat closed up and his vocal cords refused to work, somehow. He settled for crossing his arms up against his chest with a soft pat. 

Shiro immediately wrapped him up in a hug, squeezing just tight enough for his mind to blissfully blank for a few moments. He breathed out a sigh of relief. 

“It’s going to be okay,” Shiro repeated. Keith believed him. “But right now we have to hurry. I don’t know how long the distraction upstairs is going to last, or how far Zarkon and Haggar are willing to go-” 

Almost as if on cue, they felt the rumble of a distant boom echo through the stone beneath their feet. 

“What was that?!”

Shiro frowned. “I told Matt not to go overboard with the distraction...” At the quizzical look from Keith he added, “He’s been helping me prepare all month long in case Zarkon and Haggar tried... well, exactly what they ended up trying. Don’t look so shocked - he’s always helped me with this sort of thing. Exactly how did you think ‘The Phantom’ was able to appear and disappear all over the Palais as if by magic? I’m no engineer. When I first moved in here, Matt helped me set up all sorts of trapdoors and hidden rigs to add to the ones that already existed in the opera house.”

Keith’s mind whirled, even as another boom caused the stones around them to shiver ever so slightly. Just what was going on up there? 

Despite Shiro’s hurry, and possibly because of Keith’s continuing struggle to process everything he was taking in, the pair must have delayed much more than they estimated, for they burst through the doors of Shiro’s lakeside dwelling to find the Voltron team already waiting for them - Allura and Hunk still wearing their orchestra uniforms. The gang were all busy inspecting every inch of the drawing room, two of them even looking with horror through the bedroom curtain (Keith flushed red knowing exactly what it was they must be seeing). At the sight of Keith and Shiro, however, they all froze in place before immediately advancing towards them. 

“YOU-!”

Keith stepped protectively in front of Shiro. 

“What are y’all doing here. How did you even find this place?”

Pidge, growing steadily angrier by the second, opened her mouth to speak, but was preemptively disarmed by Allura’s gentle hand on her shoulder. 

“I made Coran tell us,” Allura rejoined evenly, leveling Shiro with a cool stare that steeled with determination as it slid over Keith. “Turns out kidnapping you a second time shortly after attempted mass homicide is a pretty convincing reason to finally come clean.” 

“...Just what exactly did he tell you?” But Shiro’s words were instantly drowned out by Pidge’s outburst. 

“YOU!” She repeated, glaring at Shiro with murderous intensity. “It’s  _ you! _ ‘Sven’! From the masquerade!”

The rest of the gang flipped to stare at her, then back at Shiro, mouths agape. The scarred man instinctively shot one hand up to touch the mask that he suddenly remembered was, for once, not there. 

Pidge stomped forward and grabbed Keith by the arm, dragging him away from Shiro with Hunk’s help. Shiro reached out but Pidge’s pointing finger made him shrink back. “Don’t you dare,” she hissed. “Don’t you  _ dare _ come close to Keith. You- you  _ seduced _ him, or something. I don’t know what kind of sick power you have over him, but we’re not going to let you touch a single hair on his head any longer, you hear me?” Her voice was shrill, high-strung. All five feet of her was practically vibrating with her frenetic rage. Despite having nearly a foot and a half on her, Shiro found himself stepping back and raising his hands up without even realizing it. “We were all just fine before you came along! Then  _ you _ showed up and it’s been nothing but death and danger around Keith. If you truly care for him, just let him go. He’s better off without you.” 

Shiro’s face fell. Keith saw the very moment when the old doubts crept back in, that pernicious idea he had tried so hard to bury: Shiro’s belief that he wasn’t good enough for Keith, or worse -that he was actively harmful for him. “No...” Keith began, but Pidge wouldn’t let up. 

“You’d better stay away from us, stay away from Keith. Because if you don’t, I promise you right here and now that each and every single one of us will fight you tooth and nail. He has all of us on his side, not to mention the police, and Kolivan, and Thace, and, and- and his fiance is one of the most powerful men in Paris! Perhaps you know him? That’s right; he’s already engaged... to Takashi Shirogane!” 

Shiro’s eyes opened wide and darted over to look at Keith, even as Pidge continued the endless stream of threats.

Keith had frozen in place, lost in thought. Takashi Shirogane... That must be the famed Takashi’s full name. Pidge must have found it. But there was something it reminded him of, something he had forgotten... Something there, in the back of his mind, something... For the second time that night, images from his memory flooded Keith’s vision. Instead of charred violins and closed caskets, however, this time he saw a familiar golden hallway and two familiar faces. 

_ He was back in that same hall of the Palais again, breathing hard and standing before his smiling parents. His father was running a hand through his thick umber locks and heaving out a sigh.  _

_ “Well,” he was saying in his usual Texan drawl. “At least we won’t have to worry in the future about him knocking up any dames. Oof-!” Krolia had elbowed him in the side with a quiet, “Honey!”  _

_ She bent over to look at Keith and grinned. “Is that so, Kitling? And would you introduce us to your new fiance?”  _

_ Keith turned to his side, beaming proudly, and presented the boy to his parents. It was a very young boy, couldn’t have been much older than Keith, with jet-black hair and a sweet smile. He held his hands shyly behind him but brought them forward when Keith gave a little tug on his sleeve. On the boy’s left hand was a little plastic ring with an oversized toy “diamond.” He nervously looked up at Krolia from beneath long lashes before bowing deeply. “H- hello ma’am. My name is Takashi Shirogane. But my friends call me Shiro.” _

_ Krolia melted into an adoring smile, and behind her even Tex looked charmed. “It’s a pleasure to meet you, Shiro,” and she reached down to ruffle his hair affectionately. “Take good care of our son, alright? We’ll leave him in your hands...” _

Keith felt a cool wetness streak his cheek. 

“Keith, no- Keith, Keith wait, please,” Shiro was saying in the distance. 

Slowly, Keith returned to the present. Pidge still stood between him and Shiro, but now she was looking at Keith, not Shiro, and her face looked unsure in place of the mask of rage it had been. Around them, the other members of Voltron stood staring helplessly at the situation. Shiro’s hands were clasped together, an odd reflection of the shy young boy from Keith’s unlocked memories. It was hard to make out much detail, but even through his now-watery vision Keith could see the little toy ring twinkling in the light where it nestled eternally against Shiro’s pulse.

Quietly, Keith looked up to meet his gaze. “Shiro isn’t your first name, is it.”

For one silent beat, it seemed Shiro would deny it. Then he hung his head in defeat. Keith furiously rubbed his face. He wouldn’t cry. Not over this. 

“Keith, please, I can explain,” Shiro began. 

“You  _ lied _ to me.” 

“No! I mean, yes but-”

“Not just this. First it was your mask, then about knowing my parents, then your background, and your family, and- and all along I thought, ‘It’s okay. Just this much is fine.’ But this whole time... Your entire identity, our history... Were you  _ ever  _ going to tell me?!” Keith cried out.

“... _ You’re _ Takashi Shirogane?” Pidge uttered, but it seemed as much for her own benefit than to actually ask. More than one of the gang gasped. (“Saint Takashi... is the murderous Phantom...?” Lance recited to the air.)

Shiro could only keep looking at Keith in supplication. “Yes, I was, I swear Keith. I was going to tell you that very first day but then, you didn’t remember me and- and then I didn’t want to, what we had was so good...” 

Keith turned with a scoff to mask the hurt that he couldn’t keep from his countenance. 

Shiro followed after him, hand clutching the plastic ring at his throat, determinedly pushing past Pidge’s half-hearted attempt to stop him despite her clear confusion and curiosity. The others could only look on in shock. “Keith, do you remember how I said you were my inspiration for Lohengrin? You said you hadn’t saved me. But you  _ did _ save me, Keith. You did. I...” He took a deep breath to steady himself. “For generations, my family have always been patrons of the Opera Populaire, and as a boy I often came along with my parents when they had business in the Palais. I would attend piano classes in the practice rooms, explore the basement, or play in the foyer. That’s where I first met you, playing in the halls of the opera house while you waited for your parents to finish rehearsal. I was a lonely little kid. I didn’t care about anything, I didn’t have any hopes for myself. Then you came along, with your passion and your love of music and your burning desire to prove yourself and be as great as your parents.” Shiro inhaled wetly.

Keith couldn’t look at him. “Shut up,” he whispered. “Stop it.”

“That was the first time I really  _ heard _ the music. That was the first time I had a dream. That was... my first piece. I wrote it for you, because of you. That was Margherita’s lullaby, Keith. The first piece I ever wrote, it was for you.” 

“SHUT UP!” Keith screamed, trying to block out the words. His heart burned with the overflowing urge to embrace Shiro, but he couldn’t, couldn’t stomach the deception. “You knew this whole time, how divorced from my past I feel, how desperate to hold onto  _ anything _ from my parents, from that time. How  _ dare _ you keep this from me? You had no right! And now you tell me, what, you were too  _ scared _ to tell me, is that it? All these lies just because you’re too much of a coward to confess to me, too cowardly to even show your face to the world!”

Shiro shrank back as if slapped. “You’re right,” he said dully. “I am a coward. I’m afraid. But at least hiding my face from the world is better than showing a fake one.”

Keith whirled around, eyes blazing. 

“You say  _ I’m _ a coward, Keith. But what are you? You hide behind ‘Akira’ out of fear that people will compare you with your parents if they knew your real name, don’t you? You’re so afraid that the world will reject you, that opera will reject you. You hide from your past out of fear that you don’t belong to your past, or your past to you. What’s better, Keith? Being a coward, or being a  _ liar? _ ”

Keith was striding quickly across the room now, eyes scanning until they lit upon a dark object thrown hastily onto a settee. He snatched it in trembling hands. “I don’t want to hear that from a man who hides behind a mask,” and he threw it at Shiro’s feet. “And I’m not just talking about that thing. Even your music is a mask, Shiro! Composing music, coaching me, it’s just a cover so you don’t have to interact with the world yourself, so it can’t hurt you any more than it already has. Even my voice- my  _ voice _ ...” Keith exhaled, eyes wide with the dawning realization of his own words. “ _ I _ am the mask you wear; it’s you they hear...”

“Keith, no-”

“Angel of Music,” Keith huffed sadly. “You deceived me... I gave my mind blindly.”

“No, Keith no...” Shiro crossed the space in seconds and gently reached out to touch Keith’s still-bare shoulder. When Keith didn’t pull away, he pulled him flush against himself in a tight embrace. “No, Keith. That was all you. It was always you. I merely wrote the notes; you bring them to life. You alone can make my song take flight.” Shiro’s sad gaze flickered to meet Pidge’s flummoxed one before returning to rest on the ring Keith had never taken off his neck, Shiro’s belated answer to that impulsive proposal so many years ago. “Pidge is right. I don’t deserve you. And maybe staying away from you  _ would  _ be better for you. But I’ve never claimed to be a good person. I’m selfish. I’m greedy. And I have done many bad things, Keith, but...” Softly, so that only Keith could hear the words, he sang a quiet melody against his lover’s inky hair.  _ “Would that I be redeemed by my love for you...” _

Shiro felt the slender body in his arms stiffen, then ever so slowly melt, strong arms wrapping around his scarred torso to return the embrace with passionate ferocity. Stifling a sniff, Keith straightened and pulled away to look up at his partner with a watery smile. “Isn’t that  _ my _ aria?” 

“You’ve always been Margherita to me.” 

They moved towards one another like the tide against the shore, natural as breathing, their kiss gentle and reassuring, a soothing confirmation of their mutual devotion to each other that slowly grew into something more until- 

“Ahem!” 

Keith turned around so quickly,  _ Shiro  _ got whiplash. He had completely forgotten other people were around.

The Voltron members wore looks of varying stages of disgust, not the least of which was Pidge’s: a combination of repulsion, uncertainty, and inner turmoil. When she spoke, it was with something like reluctance.

“Uh, look, I... I’m not exactly sure what’s going on anymore, but... I’m not too proud to admit when I might not have all the facts. So I think I should let you know that I texted Kolivan and Thace...” Her eyes flew wide with sudden panic behind the round rims of her glasses. “It was before I heard all the- before all... this....” and she waved her hand with mild disgust in the general direction of Keith and Shiro’s public display. “And told them how to get here, so I think maybe you should get out of here before they-” 

But she was interrupted when Hunk grabbed her arm tightly, one finger to his lips and eyes trained intently on a door on the far side of the open quarters. Faint sounds could be heard echoing through the stone behind the entryway, together with a rhythmic tapping that could have been a walking stick... or a cane. 

“Too late,” Keith muttered, dropping into a ready stance. 

Instantly, Shiro pointed to the archway to his bedroom. “Hide!” he whispered to the Voltron team in an authoritative tone Keith had never heard before but which seemed perfectly at home on Shiro’s lips. The team must have thought so, too, because they barely hesitated in surprise before immediately obeying. Shiro had just enough time to throw Keith a worn, red-and-white leather jacket that had been resting on one of the couches before the door opened calmly to reveal the familiar towering figure of the head manager of the Opera Populaire.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Nearing the end...! Chapter 20 is the last chapter, and I think I'm going to release the last two chapters at the same time - unless y'all object and would prefer to get them more spaced out, one by one? Feel free to let me know in the comments if you have an opinion one way or the other!


	18. Chapter 18

Zarkon walked through the musty door to a dingy den, lit but dimly by myriad standing candelabras set about the open-air room. He took in the tacky gold-speckled quarters and the scene as a half-dozen of his foot soldiers filed in behind him. The audacious mutt stood before him, soot-black hair sticking defiantly out in all directions after his little unmasking stunt on stage, eyes rimmed red but hardened in steely determination, half-naked as a cheap whore except for a battered crop-top jacket hanging off one shoulder. As he stared, he finished putting it on with slow, deliberate movements, as if facing down a wild animal. Hmph. At least the brat had the good sense to recognize an apex predator when he saw one. Zarkon could only imagine the nauseating debasement that must have been occurring moments before, if his state of undress was any indication.

Of greater interest was the man planted protectively beside the brat. Tall, muscular, with a commanding aura that immediately caught his interest, the man sported a full head of white hair already despite seeming to all appearances not much older than the brat himself, as well as extensive scarring across his face and what could be seen of his body. Something in his eyes, however, felt very familiar. 

“You must be the ‘Phantom’ of the opera house,” said Zarkon in a dark honeyed tone. “It’s a pleasure to finally meet in person. You’ve given us a great deal of trouble, I must confess.”

With Zarkon’s eyes disgustingly raking over his lover’s body, Keith took the opportunity to nonchalantly slip his hands into the jacket pockets. For as much as Shiro was the consummate gentleman, Keith highly doubted he would have wasted the sole precious moment they had for preparation in giving Keith something to preserve his modesty. His fingers did not have to search to feel the hard handle, a moment’s investigation following its rough line to a sharp blade. His face betrayed nothing, but his heart leapt in his chest wondering why Shiro would give  _ him _ the weapon instead of equipping himself. 

Zarkon was slowly circling Shiro, assessing eyes lingering particularly on the metal prosthetic in sickly admiration. When he looked up, he met Keith’s eyes as they wandered back from where his friends were hiding. 

“Wondering where Kolivan and Thace are, are you?” He shot with a vicious grin.

Keith attempted to look as if Zarkon had hit the mark. 

“I’m afraid they won’t be coming just yet... not for a while, if my wife has anything to say about it, and she can be very persuasive. Not until it’s too late. I rather hoped we could have done away with you by now, but tragically attacked by the opera house’s resident lunatic is almost as good as tragically felled performing his art.”

Keith’s eyes narrowed. 

Shiro, on the other hand, surprisingly said nothing. When Zarkon stared, he returned the assessing gaze; when he looked away, Shiro methodically scanned the mass of men that comprised Zarkon’s brute entourage. 

“You’re a quiet one, Phantom. How about this. I will give you this one chance to tell me everything you know about your employer, and my men here will not have to tire themselves out at the expense of your health and safety.” 

“Employer?” was Shiro’s placid reply. 

“Don’t play with me, boy,” spat Zarkon. “You are in no position to be coy. I know you must be working with Raoul -or should I say,  _ Takashi Shirogane _ .” Keith managed not to break his poker face, but it was a near thing. Zarkon knew... Shiro’s eyebrows rose slightly, but he quickly regained his composure as Zarkon continued, “What did he order you to do? Protect Akira? Sabotage my business?”

To Keith’s surprise, not only did Shiro reply - he started talking and did not stop. “Sabotage? Hardly. It is in his best interest that the Opera Populaire thrives. I was only ever instructed to protect the Opera’s prime assets, which included Akira here, and while Shirogane’s not exactly a talkative man, he did make it clear...” 

While Shiro blathered on with unflappable calm, Keith subtly adjusted his grip on the blade and shifted his weight to balance himself. He had trained with knives, of course, as part of Kolivan and Thace’s (in hindsight, much-appreciated) martial regimen. But it was one thing to train and spar in a gym and another entirely to face the blunt prospect of actually sinking cold steel into a living being. His mind raced to find alternatives. As his eyes tracked two of Zarkon’s underlings who were wandering dangerously close to Voltron’s hiding place in Shiro’s bedroom, Keith mentally ran down the list of Knowns: Zarkon was deadset on finding Raoul. Keith knew firsthand that that monster and Haggar would not bat an eye at whatever body count was necessary to do so. From his words before, it seemed clear that Zarkon had descended to the bowels of the opera house already prepared to do away with Keith, the Phantom, and any others who would stand in the way of his goal. Hell, he wanted to do away with Keith regardless, goal or no. In short, they were not making it out of this basement alive, if Zarkon had anything to say about it.

Could they run? Keith didn’t think they’d make it too far with all of Zarkon’s goons on their heels - not to mention the additional staff that would likely be waiting for them upstairs. Then there was Voltron. If he and Shiro ran, Zarkon’s men would waste no time ransacking the place for clues to Raoul’s identity and they would find Pidge and the others. 

Even if they all made it out of here somehow, what could they do? Turn to the police to escape Zarkon? ‘The Phantom’ was wanted for murder, and justified as it might be in Keith’s eyes, Shiro not coming forward immediately after killing Sendak would not look good in the eyes of any jury. He would be charged with manslaughter at the very least; they would be separated. 

No. What they needed was time. Time to find a way to obscure Shiro’s identity and throw Zarkon and Haggar off the trail. And the only way they were going to get that time is by incapacitating Zarkon and company first. Newfound determination coursing through his veins, Keith stepped forward. 

Both Shiro and Zarkon turned to him. Zarkon sneered. “Oh? Have something to say, Amazing Akira?”

“Yeah, actually,” said Keith with a bravery he did not quite feel. “And the name’s not Akira. It’s Keith. Keith Kogane. My voice is the reason why your auditorium is packed every night. Nice to meet you, and you’re fucking welcome. I think you and I both know you’re not going to harm a hair on his -or my- head. Because you need me. It won’t be good press for the slightest bit of danger to befall ‘Akira’ in the Opera Populaire. It would be a PR nightmare -the end of your managerial career at the very least. What’s more...” but Keith trailed off. 

His threat didn’t land quite as effectively as he had hoped. Zarkon didn’t even appear to have kept listening. His normally stoic expression had twisted ever so slightly into something that resembled more confusion than fear. “Keith Kogane? Son of Krolia Kogane and Stephen ‘Tex’ Kogane?”

Keith took a step back. “What?”

The look of confusion on Zarkon’s face morphed into a menacing smile. “I could not have planned it better myself. Who would have thought I would be in this position again, with their son, no less?” He was practically oozing sickening glee. 

“What are you talking about?” Keith’s voice broke halfway through into a fearful whisper. 

Zarkon barked out a dark laugh. “I can’t believe I never pieced it together. ‘Akira,’ an orphan... right... I suppose you have me to blame for your tragic childhood isolation.” The mountain of a man inclined his torso in a mocking bow, snickering some more.

“What the  _ fuck _ are you talking about?” Keith repeated lowly, but the intensity in his cold stare let on that he was beginning to understand. 

“Oh come now boy, must I spell out for you? Are you daft as well as talentless? Your progenitors. Mom-my-and-dad-dy.” He made clear his waning interest by picking off a piece of lint from his jacket, eyes once again growing bored. “As you might guess after this evening’s... festivities... I’m rather partial to fire.” A spark burned in those bored eyes as he turned them to Keith on the last word. 

Keith’s face was a mask of horror. In the back of his mind, it vaguely occurred to him that he ought to keep up his acting facade, feign indifference or at the very least calm control, but the sight-memory of charred violins once again haunted his eyes, and those inescapable headlines on every channel for days afterwards...:  _ ‘Paris Opera burns.’ _

“Why,” he whispered, already feeling the familiar sting behind his sinuses. 

“Business,” Zarkon all but yawned. “It was almost a shame -they truly were talented classical performers, best of the best- but as such they were impediments to the career success of certain valuable assets. So they had to be disposed of.” 

Keith had not even realized he was moving until he was already almost upon Zarkon, fist held high and ready to fly. He leapt forward so quickly, Shiro did not even have time to react - he was still holding an arm out as if to reach for Keith when Zarkon made his move. Swiping aside Keith’s arm as if swatting a bug, Zarkon twisted and with the other hand he slapped the young man with such force that Keith tumbled down and into Shiro’s arms, almost toppling one of the nearby candelabras, its flickering flames reflected in Zarkon’s cruel pupils. 

Shiro growled. 

Behind Zarkon, a group of his men suddenly cried out. Team Voltron had attacked from the shadows. Allura and Lance each grabbed one man in a headlock, while Hunk took a running start to bowl into two men at once. Pidge clambered atop one of the biggest underlings and latched onto his neck, clawing manically at any vulnerable bit she could reach. With a wet squelch, she dug her nails in deep as they would go. 

_ “MY EYES!!” _

The resounding screech drew Zarkon’s attention for only a moment, but it was enough. Shiro looked down to quickly inspect Keith’s rapidly-reddening left cheek. It would swell, but the injury didn’t look too serious; judging by Keith’s focused gaze, a concussion was unlikely. 

Silently, swiftly, Shiro raised his brow and made a single gesture. 

Keith nodded. 

When Zarkon turned back to face the couple, it was to Shiro twisting in place, spinning Keith by his arms up and around to deliver Keith’s boot straight into Zarkon’s jaw. Zarkon fell. He immediately moved to roll back up into a low stance, but Keith didn’t give him time to regroup. He rushed headlong towards the man, despite Zarkon being twice his size. It was for his parents. It was for his friends. It was for Shiro. There was no room to worry about anything else. 

Zarkon met his onslaught, arms like iron bars grabbing Keith’s shirt and redirecting the energy to throw Keith off balance and to the side, but Shiro was there to follow up with a precise right hook and a side step, staying out of reach and pulling Zarkon’s attention away from where Keith lay groaning behind him on the stone floor. Zarkon eyes flashed. He took a second to dash a hand across his face, messily smearing the blood that had begun trickling from his nostril, and lunged towards Shiro. In one fluid movement, Shiro bounced back, dodged Zarkon’s right fist, his left. Zarkon feinted another right, finally catching Shiro off guard and kicking out against Shiro’s right knee. 

Shiro hit the ground with a grunt. In an instant, Zarkon was there, driving his foot into Shiro’s face, his stomach. Shiro’s head swam. He couldn’t breathe. Zarkon’s kick knocked all the breath out of him and he struggled to suck in as much oxygen as possible before the next kick to his abdomen hammered a sharp stake of pain through his body. 

“Insolent fools!” Zarkon gritted out in between kicks. “When I’m done with you, you- URGH!” 

Zarkon stopped kicking. Gasping through his haze, Shiro looked up to see Keith, still crawling on the floor but hand wrapped tightly around the knife Shiro had hidden in the jacket pocket. The knife that was currently buried deep in the back of Zarkon’s left thigh. It made a nauseating noise as Keith yanked it back out. Blood immediately began to seep out, but it seemed Keith hadn’t nicked the artery. 

Like lightning, Zarkon snatched up Keith’s collar, holding the smaller man up and off the ground in an intimidating display of strength. Keith struggled, grunted, spat in Zarkon’s face. Zarkon did not, therefore, see Keith calmly toss the knife underhand towards Shiro. It hit the candelabra by Shiro’s head, glancing off and causing the candles to sway. Shiro stared at them for a moment, forcing himself to pull together through the ringing in his head that Zarkon’s strike had left. 

Grabbing the knife, he scrambled to his feet and thrust the blade into the flames until it blackened and grew so hot that Shiro could feel it in the handle. He could hear Keith struggling behind him and hurling obscenities at Zarkon while the two grappled with each other. The sounds of punches and cries could be heard further away where the Voltron members continued to keep Zarkon’s minions busy. 

“That should do it,” Shiro muttered to himself just as he heard Zarkon behind him heave a tremendous grunt of effort.

Tensing his muscles, he held up the heated blade, whirled around and - Keith’s face took up his entire vision. 

“AAAAHH!”

It was only a moment, but Keith’s tortured shriek echoed endlessly in Shiro’s ears, the gut-churning stench of burning human flesh -sickeningly similar to barbecued pork- inundated his nostrils and clung to his pores. The momentum from Zarkon’s throw kept Keith’s face pushed against Shiro’s blade as both of them were sent tumbling backwards. Christ, Shiro could almost taste it on his tongue. The smoke from his beloved’s _scorched_ _skin_. He wanted to throw up. He was back there again, back where he had vowed never to return. As if from a distance, he vaguely registered Keith’s face before him, a gnarled red slash rising up his right cheek, as he tried to disentangle himself from Shiro. He was forming words but the sounds didn’t make sense. 

Keith was frantic. Shiro sat frozen on the ground where he had fallen like a lead weight as soon as the blade accidentally made contact with Keith’s cheek. The searing pain in his cheek made his eyes water, but he pushed aside any thoughts of the horrible burning sensation to gently grab Shiro’s blanched face. 

“S- Angel! I know you’re in there. Come back to me, _please,_ baby. I love you!” A glimmer of recognition sparked in Shiro’s haunted eyes yet they still stared back, unseeing. 

The stone below him vibrated beneath Zarkon’s thundering steps. Keith grabbed the still-hot dagger in both hands, sprang up, and turned just in time to block Zarkon’s onyx-head cane, Shiro safely shielded behind him. Keith’s thoughts raced. If he parried to the side, Shiro would be exposed. Unfortunately, Zarkon made the choice for him. 

The towering man slid his cane down along Keith’s blade, causing Keith to teeter to one side. Lightning fast, the cane whipped through the air and back around to sweep Keith’s legs, then thrust forward into his gut, sending him flying back and against Shiro. 

Keith gasped for air, winded from the blow. Beneath him, Shiro stirred and groaned, holding onto his temple with a groan. Zarkon stepped towards them and disdainfully kicked Keith aside. Barely managing to breathe as he was, Keith had apparently been designated as a non-threat. 

“No,” Keith rasped weakly when Zarkon grabbed Shiro by the fluffy pale forelock through which Keith had so often lovingly run his fingers. Shiro winced again, but his eyes remained confused, unfocused. Zarkon spared a glance at the prosthetic that hung loosely by Shiro’s side, then with a forceful grip suddenly twisted it in its socket.

Shiro screamed. 

“Stop it!” Keith tried to yell. It felt as if his lungs were burning with each inhale. It didn’t matter. Nothing mattered but Shiro, and he had to do something to stop Zarkon. Shiro had suffered enough for several lifetimes. 

Jagged scars and cigarette burns running through his mind, Keith hauled himself to his feet, every muscle in his body protesting the strain. He almost toppled over immediately after, but grabbed the back of a nearby settee at the last moment. He forced himself to breathe in, out.  _ Patience yields focus _ , his mind helpfully supplied in the voice he loved most in the world. 

It still hurt to breathe from the hit to his abdomen. He limped on his left leg from falling on that knee against the stony ground. Pain lanced through his pummeled ribs with every inhalation, and his muscles ached from grappling with Zarkon. Yet he stepped forward again, and again. And again. 

Clueless to Keith’s struggle behind him, Zarkon reared back, cane in hand, ready to deal a final blow to Shiro while the latter struggled to get on his feet. Shiro looked up to stare into the unfeeling eyes of the man about to kill him.  _ Of all the ways to go. Not this. Not now, _ he thought foggily, closing his eyes and seeing Keith - Keith’s eyes sparkling as he threw his head back in a hearty laugh, his dusky bangs hanging messily over his eyes as he concentrated during singing practice, his lips ruddy and parted as he panted above Shiro and moaned his name. A much nicer final view. 

Beyond the darkness of his lids, a dull thud rang out. Shiro looked up in time to see Zarkon go rigid. His eyes rolled back, and he swayed on his feet for one breathless second before collapsing to reveal Keith behind him, chest heaving and arms shaking from the effort of holding up the golden candelabra. 

“God, this thing is heavy,” was all he said as he let it clatter to the floor. 

Even in his semi-incoherent state, Shiro couldn’t help but give a weak chuckle before falling back against the cold stone. Somehow, Keith found the superhuman strength to resist melting in exhaustion too and instead ran to Shiro’s side, cradling him in his arms. 

“I’m alright, I’m alright,” Shiro muttered sleepily even as Keith frantically ran his hands all over to check for any serious injuries. “But boy am I looking forward to sleeping like the dead tonight...”

Keith breathed out a raw, relieved laugh that trembled with residual adrenaline, roughly wiping at his eyes with the back of his arm. “As long as you don’t actually join them, you big idiot. Don’t you dare leave me after all I had to do to keep you. You hear me? You’re not allowed. I even had to give away my secret identity -  _ and I really enjoyed having my privacy, by the way.” _

Shiro smiled fondly up at him and lifted a hand to wipe away the watery evidence Keith hadn’t quite managed to erase. “Okay,” he whispered. But his face fell as his eyes landed on the scar he had put there, his expression at once regretful and horrified. “Oh god Keith, your... I’m so sorry!”

“Shh, it’s fine. Now we match,” he tried for levity, pointing at the scar across the bridge of Shiro’s nose.

“It’s not fucking  _ fine _ , Keith! Jesus! We have to get you some help, we need wate-” 

From across the room, someone screamed out, “Pidge!” and Shiro and Keith at once raced towards the sound. They staggered to a stop where Hunk and Lance were neutralizing the last of Zarkon’s mooks, a bloody dagger falling from the man’s hands. 

Keith’s eyes immediately shot to Pidge, and his heart stopped. 

Crumpled to the ground, the small woman looked somehow even smaller than usual as she held pale hands to her bloody abdomen. Allura was holding her up from behind, shaking hands carefully supporting Pidge’s arms. There was a haunted look in her eyes and her cheeks were drained and gray, but she still murmured soothing words in Pidge’s ears. 

“Pidge,” exhaled Keith, rushing to her side. 

While Shiro hurriedly ripped part of his shirt to staunch the bleeding, Keith tried to dial 112 with violently trembling fingers until Hunk came and took the phone from him so as to do it himself. 

“Have them meet us by the Rotonde de l'Empereur; it’s the closest access point to the street,” Shiro called out to Hunk while the latter paced rapidly trying to find a good reception spot. That authoritative tone was back, solid and comforting and ringing with an urgency that compelled one to immediately follow whatever orders it gave. “Allura, hold the cloth in firmly. Lance, grab my phone and text Matt to meet us at the rendezvous spot. Keith, scout ahead and clear the way - you know the passages.” 

Ever so carefully, Shiro lifted Pidge’s small body into a cradle carry, gritting his teeth as the weight hung on his abused prosthetic. She felt so light, almost like a child instead of the fiery woman he knew her to be. If anything happened to her, Matt would... - no, she’d make it. She had to. In his arms, Pidge stirred with a muted groan. 

“Shh, shh, don’t move sweetheart. You’ll make it worse,” Allura crooned from the side, still holding the bloody rag to the wound as best she could while Shiro held a steady pace. With quiet intensity, the team made haste through the darkness of bowels of the opera house.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So far, between comments and outside readers, votes are leaning slightly towards posting chapters 19 and 20 at the same time. Get your votes in before Tuesday if you haven't already done so!


	19. Chapter 19

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Not sure if needed, but just in case: Content Warning for description of patient in hospital. Not graphic or anything; it’s just the setting.

Pidge woke blearily to a rush of colors and sounds. The first thing she noticed was the night sky. So it was still night, and she was outdoors. The next was a shaggy mane of hair bobbing animatedly at her side and lit by alternating hues of red and blue. 

“Matt,” she croaked. Moving her arm felt like pressing a three-ton dumbbell, but she somehow managed a haphazard wave in his general direction. 

Matt froze in the middle of a frenzy of voiced words and wild gesticulations at a patient-looking EMT. Between them stood Shiro, looking harried but steadfast, and a roughed-up and agitated Keith, who leaned heavily on Shiro like a tempest-tossed tugboat at long last moored to a hardy port. 

“H- hey. Hey Pigeon,” said Matt with obvious forced calm as he leaned over the stretcher. It must be bad, then. She could always tell when he was really anxious from the way his voice came out louder than he meant it to. “Everything’s okay. You’re gonna be fine, but I need you to stay quiet right now and not move, okay?” 

She tried lifting her arms again at him, but he gently lowered them with a stern shake of his head. She rolled her eyes and tried to say she was fine, but all that came out was a moan as she felt another jolt of pain cut through her. Professional-sounding voices near her head spoke in short, urgent tones.

“We really need to go. Ready to move?” 

“Straps are secure.” 

“What hospital are you taking her to?!” cried a voice that she recognized as Keith’s.

She looked up again and saw stars. That was strange. Usually Paris’ light pollution was so bad, you couldn’t see many stars in the sky. Vaguely she registered a soft, dainty hand gently holding her own before the stars disappeared again, along with everything else.

~~~

The next time she woke, it was to an offensively white room and a chorus of soft, intermittent beeps.  _ Hospital _ , her mind helpfully supplied. She immediately closed her eyes against the visual onslaught. Why were all the lights so bright and the sounds so loud? Wasn’t proper rest important for healing? From somewhere in the room she finally registered, somewhat sluggishly due to the residual sedation, the uninterrupted murmur of soft voices that chattered on, apparently unaware of her mostly-conscious state. 

“...I can’t believe she would just jump in front of a knife like that. I always knew she was the bravest of us, but damn.”

“She saved my life,” answered a silky voice with a fond hum.

“Yeah, yeah she did...” the other replied, just as warmly. “She really... loves you... I have to apologize for the way I’ve been acting, Allura. No, wait, let me say it. I need to say it.” A pause. “I was really surprised, you know, when you two made the announcement. I guess I just couldn’t get a handle on- I didn’t take it well. It was hard for me to accept, but that’s no excuse. You two are my friends -my best friends, who I really care for and always will, no matter what- and instead of being happy for you I just thought about myself and got all wrapped up in my own head, as usual. I’m... I truly am sorry, Allura.” 

“If it will make you feel better, I accept your apology Lance. But in my opinion, it is not needed. I understand that it was a difficult time for you, and I do not want you to ever feel as if you need to apologize for your feelings.” 

Silence hung in the air for a few moments before someone exhaled with a loud huff. 

“Wow, look at us, being all adult and mature and stuff. Think I’ve leveled up my Real Person stats again?”

Allura softly laughed. 

A chair squeaked twice, three times, and Lance said, “Uh, I  _ am _ happy for you two though. Not that you need it, of course, but you two have my... blessing or, whatever. For what it’s worth.” 

“Thank you Lance,” whispered Allura. “I bet she’ll be really glad to hear it when she wakes up.” 

“Yeah.” 

Fighting hard to keep from smiling, Pidge focused on keeping her breathing even as she let herself fall back into slumber, more light and airy than she’d felt in weeks, despite the dull pain in her torso.

~~~

He really should have expected it, thought Keith as the nurse fussed over his cheek. As soon as they had seen Pidge safely being wheeled to the OR, Shiro had turned on Keith and practically dragged him off to be seen for his leg, his burn, his everything. 

“What a shame,” the nurse tutted. She was round and brunette and reminded Keith of a kindly old aunt, if he had ever had one. When she leaned in close, he was hit with the scent of peppermint candies. “I’m going to put a honey bandage on it, but I’m afraid it’s still going to scar, dear.” 

“Honey?”

“Yes, it helps with burn wounds.”

“That’s not a thing.” Keith immediately deadpanned. 

She laughed, bright and loud. “It most definitely  _ is _ a thing. It’s not the same honey from your kitchen cabinet, of course, but it really does help. Sometimes the most powerful help comes from the sweet, simple things in life.” 

“Yeah,” he muttered, rubbing at his cheek absent-mindedly. 

She slapped his hand away. “No touching! Doc says you won’t need a cast for your leg, but stay off your feet for the next two weeks. As for your ribs, just... try not to move. Somehow, you strike me as the sort for whom that’ll be difficult, so-” She turned to Shiro, who had not yet left Keith’s side except to check on Matt. “You. Make sure he follows my instructions.” 

“To the tee, ma’am,” the charming bastard said with a wink. 

“Traitor,” said Keith. 

When the nurse left, Shiro drew the curtain and returned to the bedside. “They said Pidge is out of the OR and recovering in a private room. Feeling up for the walk?”

He smirked. “I thought you were supposed to be in charge of keeping me off my feet.” 

Shiro shrugged. “I figured you would object to a bridal carry.” 

In spite of Keith’s pride, his leg was truly aching now, so they compromised on a piggyback ride. Once over the initial wince from his bruised ribs, it was a mildly less mortifying manner in which to travel through the sterile, pastel halls of the hospital. Keith poked the side of Shiro’s neck with his nose. 

“You have to get looked at, too, you know.” 

“They gave me a quick once-over while you were in the scanner. To check on the prosthetic I need to see a highly unique specialist; they wouldn’t be able to do that here anyway.” 

Keith nodded, then lowered his voice. “What did you tell them happened?”

“The truth. That we were attacked in the middle of the opera house incident and got these injuries while fighting back in self-defense,” Shiro replied pointedly. 

“Zarkon knows now. Maybe not about your name, but he knows your appearance. And since it was always known that the opera ghost was the one who killed Sendak...”

“Surmised, not known. Matt-” Shiro subtly glanced around. “Well, we can talk details later, but suffice it to say the official channels aren’t seriously entertaining even the existence of the opera ghost as a certainty. They’re just investigating various members of the Palais staff - I  _ am  _ sorry to  _ them _ , but at least I’m sure their innocence will be made more than clear by the evidence available. I made certain of it. As for Zarkon... I’ll figure something out.” 

“ _ We’ll  _ figure something out,” Keith corrected. “We’re a team now.” And he tapped the plastic toy ring around Shiro’s neck. In the harsh fluorescent hospital lighting, Keith thought he saw a faint rosy blush across Shiro’s cheeks. 

“Right.  _ We’ll _ figure something out,” he agreed as he opened the door to Pidge’s room. 

They were immediately met with a strident crow. “Keith! Keith’s Boytoy!”

Shiro frowned. 

“Lance, quiet! Pidge needs her rest,” Hunk admonished from where he was sitting at the bedside arranging Pidge’s messy brown locks. Allura and Matt stood by the window, Allura speaking in hushed tones into her phone and Matt texting. They both looked up when Shiro and Keith entered, but only Allura came over after a hurried, “Have to go, Coran,” into the mic. Meeting Shiro’s gaze with a dark look, Matt signed,  _ “Parents,” _ and turned back to his phone.

Keith barely had time to slide off his partner’s back before he was accosted with long silver curls in his face and surprisingly strong arms around his tender ribs. “Allura!” he wheezed, and she immediately released him with a soft apology. 

“She’s going to be okay,” she said before he could even ask. “They said she just needed to rest and recuperate, but it could have been much worse.” Her face was still gaunt and colorless, but at least her vivid blue eyes had regained some of their usual spark.

Not trusting himself to speak, Keith simply nodded as he moved over to hold Pidge’s hand. She was out cold, but didn’t appear to be in any pain. Various clinical monitors, tubes, and bags surrounded the bed, a rainbow of numbers and lines lighting up the screens and breaking up the creamy white of the plastic casings and the cold gray of the metal frames. Next to the rigid hospital machines, she looked particularly soft and vulnerable. Human. Alive. 

Keith let out a breath he didn’t realize he was holding. 

“Matt contacted their parents. They’re flying in tomorrow - they think it was a random attack in the midst of the chaos of the opera house incident. That’s what Shiro and I told the hospital.” 

“Thanks, Hunk,” Keith murmured, still looking at Pidge. 

“On the bright side, it doesn’t look like anyone else was seriously harmed from the chandelier falling! Only some mild trampling...” he tapered off. 

“That’s good,” Keith nodded absent-mindedly. 

The silence hung heavy as a stormcloud in the room. 

“So!” Lance suddenly called out, and Hunk jumped slightly in his seat. “Turns out you’re the famous Saint Takashi, huh?”

All eyes turned to where Shiro was standing silently by the door as if trying to shrink into the shadows. He shifted his weight and looked down. “Uh, yeah.” It was hard to believe this was the same man that had only hours before confidently mobilized all of them as if they were a veteran SEAL team. 

Lance strode up to him with a mixture of curiosity and challenge in his face. Shiro stared back, bewildered. After a solid minute of eye contact, however, Lance seemed to find what he was searching for in Shiro’s gaze, and he wrapped him up in a crushing bear hug. 

“Thank you for helping with Pidge... and for taking care of Keith,” Shiro heard the lanky man mumble into his shirt. 

His eyes softened, and he slowly brought his arms around to return the embrace. “Of course. Matt is like family... that means Pidge is, too.” Shiro looked towards the pristine white hospital bed at the small figure swaddled in the sheets, then met Keith’s beautiful violet gaze. “And Keith is...” He swallowed. 

“Keith is going to  _ officially  _ be family very shortly,” his lover announced firmly to the room, undoing the chain around his neck and slipping the minute diamond flower back onto his left finger where it had always belonged. Allura’s eyes went wide. Hunk and Lance’s jaws dropped. 

“You mean that  _ thing  _ was- You two are- I thought it was just one of your stupid rockstar fashion things!” said Lance when he regained the ability to speak. 

“Hey! What’s wrong with my fashion?” Keith lowered his brow.

Lance just shook his head. It wasn’t worth trying to explain. 

Hunk swayed slightly in his chair. 

Allura placed a hand to steady Hunk as she spoke with halting care. “Congratulations, Keith... and Takashi-”

“Just Shiro, please.”

“...Shiro. But as grateful as I am to you, Shiro, for your help with Pidge, and for protecting our Keith as I know you have-”

“‘Our’ Keith?” the man himself muttered.

“-you can understand that my concerns are no fewer. You  _ ki- _ ahem, there is still the matter of the Sendak issue, and the kidnapping, and bringing down the chandelier on top of all those people- You can’t expect us to just forget about all of it. We don’t know anything about you.” Allura drew herself up to full height, elegant silver brows drawn, looking every bit a princess and a captain, despite her disheveled hair and the bloody abrasions on her knuckles. 

“No,” Shiro simply said.

“No?”

He took a step forward and faced her just as seriously as she did him. “No, I don’t expect you all to forget about it. You were wrong after all, Lance. I’m  _ not  _ ‘Saint’ Takashi. Honestly, I may not even be a decent person. I’ve done many things in my past that I regret. And for a long time I too thought I shouldn’t get close to Keith, that I didn’t deserve him... But that only ended up hurting both of us. I’m not going to leave him again, not as long as he still wants me by his side. So to address those concerns of yours: I have never in my life kidnapped anyone, the chandelier was all Matt, those seats were empty, and Sendak? As unfortunate as that was I will not apologize for doing whatever is necessary to save Keith’s life.” 

“Well, no but, I mean, I recognize that Keith could have died, but-” she sputtered and looked around, finally settling troubled eyes on Keith. His face was half-obscured by a bandage and a blooming contusion across his left cheek. If she closed her eyes, she could still see the angry purple marks that had made a home for weeks on his fair neck. Her shoulders drooped and she half-sank onto the bed next to Pidge, argument dying on her tongue. 

Keith reached over the bed and placed his hand over hers. “Thank you Allura, but Shiro’s right. Hell, if I could’ve, I would’ve gotten that fucker myself.” He shot a side glance at Shiro and smirked. “And as I’m pretty sure I’ve told y’all a million times, I most definitely was not kidnapped - Shiro and I were having a grand old tim-” 

“ _ OH _ -KAY! No need to finish that sentence, it’s cool!” Lance jumped in, hands over his ears. 

Keith rolled his eyes. 

This time when the room fell back into silence, it was a comfortable one. 

~~~

Pidge healed faster than the team had even hoped. By the next day, she was awake enough to talk with her parents with almost as much fire as usual. By the following one, she was back to her devious self - although still bedbound, to her great displeasure. 

“Oh, just enjoy it Pidge,” Hunk mumbled through a mouthful of the banana-nut muffins he’d brought. “Think of it like a vacation, except a lot more sucky ‘cause of the view, and the hospital food, and the daily blood draws for lab testing, and the-”

“ _ Yes, thank you  _ Hunk _ , _ ” she griped plaintively while signing. “This is exactly what I mean. I feel  _ fine _ , and I need to help with he-who-shall-not-be-named.” 

_ “No can do, Pigeon,”  _ said Matt, swiping a muffing right out of her hands and stuffing it in his mouth to leave his hands free.  _ “The Authorities said they would have my head if I let you leave this bed for a single second.”  _

_ “Stop calling mom and dad ‘The Authorities’ - it’s confusing if I want to ask you about monitoring the police radios.” _

_ “For that I would only use, ‘cop.’ Ok, how about ‘emperor’ for our parents?” _

_ “What’s that sign mean?” _

_ “E-M-P-E-R-O-R.”  _

_ “That’s worse.” _

Hunk watched them fall into signing, and relaxed his focus back onto his phone and his text conversation with the rest of the Voltron team - into which they had now formally inducted Matt and Shiro. In the past two days, they had not heard word from Zarkon, but the team was no less worried for it. Matt had taken over Pidge’s unofficial duties as surveillance agent, sitting at her bedside day and night with his laptop, and Shiro had resumed his regular haunting patrols, against Keith’s urging. 

Now that Zarkon knew how to access the lower levels, Keith argued, it was only a matter of time before he discovered the rest of the passageways. Shiro kissed each of his eyelids and said they didn’t have a choice if they wanted to be prepared for whatever Zarkon and Haggar did next. 

Yet all had remained silent. Zarkon had not returned to his offices in the Palais, likely convalescing at home, and Haggar had merely been managing the necessities of the opera house’s keeping in the wake of the disaster that had been  _ Faust Ascending’s _ opening night. Lance mused that she might have her hands too full with managing the PR fallout to worry about something as petty as a feud with the Phantom and ‘Raoul.’ 

Keith doubted it, but couldn’t entirely dismiss the possibility. The media had been having a field day with that night’s events: a magnetic performance, followed by the spectacular reveal of the mysterious and beloved Akira’s true identity, followed by the disastrous destruction of parts of the opera house, including the iconic crystal chandelier that was synonymous with the Palais. The news had been running non stop covering the panicked crowds, the structural damage to a priceless architectural icon, and speculation on the true identity of the dark-haired youth that everyone had until now known as ‘Akira.’

Said youth had been laying low, which had proved blessedly easy thanks to the bandages and bruises that covered his face, but with every passing day he felt the pressure from Kolivan and Thace to release a public statement. Keith was scared. Putting aside the ever-looming threat of Zarkon and Haggar, a full identity-reveal risked thrusting Shiro into the public light - a dangerous venture for many reasons. As long as Zarkon was a concern, Shiro would never be able to be publicly recognized as Takashi Shirogane, and the more Keith himself was exposed, the greater would be the scrutiny on Shiro and his identity. 

“Ugh, what a mess.” Keith massaged his temples as he stepped into the hospital room. Hunk looked up from his phone. 

“Whoa, when you texted you’d be here in a minute I figured it was a figure of speech. Where’s Tak- Shiro?” 

Keith nodded behind him just as the man in question followed him in. Both looked somewhat haggard, but less battered than they had two nights ago. Lance and Allura brought up the rear, the latter immediately rushing to Pidge’s bedside to greet her with a careful kiss (“I’m  _ fine _ , Allura. You don’t have to handle me so gently!”).

_ “Get your arm checked out?”  _ said Matt as he turned towards Shiro. 

_ “All clear,”  _ Shiro signed back. 

Matt answered with a playful punch to the socket, which nearly bowled Shiro over from the pain. 

_ “Not THAT clear, asshole!”  _ He chuckled and flipped him off with his left arm.

Matt returned it with a jovial grin. Feeling pairs of eyes darting between him and Shiro, he finally caved. “What? What is it?”

Lance scratched the back of his head, but seemed to decide to hold back this time. Instead, he nudged Hunk. The latter gave a long-suffering sigh. “Guess I’m taking one for the team this round? Fine,” he groaned. He looked back and forth between Shiro and Matt, waving in their general direction. “Anyone gonna explain what  _ this _ is all about? How could  _ you two _ possibly know each other?” he huffed, and Shiro interpreted. 

The two men exchanged an amused look, but after a small smile and nod from Shiro, Matt answered.  _ “This is him.”  _

Pidge narrowed her eyes. 

Matt grinned even more widely.  _ “ _ The very-private-person. Mom and dad’s future adopted son.”

Pidge nearly jumped out of her bed and turned wild eyes on Shiro, as if seeing him in a new light. “Oh my god.” 

“The... the guy you were telling us about who saved your life?” Hunk said dumbfoundedly. 

Matt turned from Keith’s interpreting to nod at Hunk. 

Lance made a show of swooning. “Damn it, we don’t have any popcorn on hand this time. I can’t keep up with these revelations. You trying to tell us that this whole time it was  _ you? _ Matt’s friend, Raoul, Keith’s squeeze, the Ph-” Keith clapped a hand over his mouth with an angry glare. Lance continued behind the hand with a muffled, “All of them?”

_ “Is the great and powerful Katie actually crying?”  _ Matt teased. 

“Shut up!” she warbled, her voice failing her halfway through.  _ “Do you know how long I’ve been waiting to meet-? Oh, just come here,”  _ she signed, and Shiro obeyed. With a strength that he would not have expected from someone recovering from an exploratory laparotomy, she crushed him to her and blubbered into his shirt. “Fuck it, to hell with Sendak. Next time, I’ll even help you bury the body.”


	20. Chapter 20

It was on the day of Pidge’s discharge, five days since  _ Faust’ _ s opening night, that he received the message. Kolivan and Thace called Keith’s cell in the middle of the night to inform him, in their usual militaristic style, that Zarkon and Haggar had resigned from the management of the Opera Populaire, citing financial difficulties related to the disaster. Since Zarkon and Haggar’s latest machinations had not only gotten the two men involved but even made them complicit in their scheme, Keith had soon after opening night been forced to finally fill them in on the grim couple’s continued attempts on Keith’s life as well as their role in his parents’ deaths. They had been... displeased... with Keith, but had radiated nearly homicidal intentions towards Zarkon and Haggar, so Keith was immediately suspicious when he heard the sudden news of their resignation. Nevertheless, upon him questioning them, they earnestly insisted they had not yet had the chance to act against Zarkon and Haggar and there was something else at play behind their withdrawal.

“...Yet?” Keith repeated. 

In the past few days, he had also filled his managers in on Shiro, and Matt, and the chandelier, and Sendak - emphasizing, of course, the threat to Keith’s life and the immediate urgency to neutralize the threat. As it turned out, the extra care was not needed because to Keith’s slight perturbation, the two men had accepted the course of action with what seemed like almost  _ casual  _ aplomb, and, if anything, had actually solidly thumped Shiro’s back in apparent approval. After exchanging their service histories, the three had immediately fallen in sync, bonding over their singular goal of caring for Keith. Keith had left the room.

“I’m actually kind of glad something happened before Kolivan and Thace had the chance to take matters into their own hands. I’m starting to believe they wouldn’t shy away from more drastic measures,” he muttered and signed now as the team settled around Keith’s personal quarters in the morning, following Keith’s group text. Sections of the opera house had been closed off for repairs, but the wing with the performers’ quarters remained open for those who lived there. 

“I still can’t believe Zarkon and Haggar made them  _ and us _ accomplices to their plan from the very start. We thought the whole trap idea had been Kolivan and Thace’s - we’re so sorry Keith,” said Hunk. 

But Keith merely waved a hand. “I get it. You were worried. As long as you understand now that I’m not giving Shiro up.”

Lance groaned and leaned his chair back. “Alright alright, enough already. I’m about to hurl with all these passionate declarations of love and fealty. Seriously, you two are disgusting. Spare a thought for other people’s stomachs, will ya? I think I miss you keeping your relationship a secret - I shudder to imagine how we would’ve otherwise been subjected to this the entire. time.”

Beside him, Allura smiled but didn’t disagree. 

Shiro chuckled too, then lifted his hands again - ungloved now in front of the group, just as he was unmasked. “Alright guys, let’s focus. As I was saying, I appreciate you all accepting... the situation, but I don’t want you having to get involved in this. This is my mess, and I don’t want you risking your safety any more than you already have. Zarkon and Haggar are dangerous.” 

“Which is precisely why we’re going to help. Just accept it: you’re part of the family now - through more ways than one,” Pidge insisted, nodding towards Matt and Keith. She was propped up against Keith’s pillows and soon resumed her labor assiduously tying Shiro’s hair fluff in tiny little bunches.

“If it wasn’t Kolivan and Thace, then why haven’t Zarkon and Haggar already looked for Shiro’s identity?” Matt frowned. “Shiro’s been watching the halls and they haven’t so much as gone searching for more information down there.” 

At a sharp knock on the door, everyone jumped. 

“Coming!” Keith shouted as Matt hurriedly stuffed Shiro in the wardrobe. 

“I certainly hope not,” came the indolent drawl from the other side of the door. “I don’t need to see  _ that  _ disaster this early in the morning.”

Keith opened it and froze. “Lotor?! What are you doing here?” 

“Volunteering for Meals for the Elderly. Can I come in?”

“Uhh-” 

“Thanks.” And he strolled inside as if he paid rent there. “Oh look, the whole sideshow is here. You’re new...” he paused, narrowed eyes looking at Matt, then his eyes slid to where Pidge was interpreting. 

“Go on, no need to slow down on my account,” Matt smiled pleasantly. 

“Right...” Lotor lifted one eyebrow and then promptly ignored them all to stare down Keith. “Kitten.”

“Don’t call me that,” Keith growled. 

“So short with me. And when I come bearing gifts, no less. Alright then, Little Lotte.”

“That’s not better. And last time you offered a ‘gift,’ it was the gift of sexual assault.” 

Lance spit out his latte.  _ “WHAT?!” _

“It’s fine, it’s fine, ‘the Phantom’ got there in time,” Keith waved flippantly. 

Allura frowned and raised a finger in objection, but Lotor was already running his mouth again before she could say anything. 

“Not to mention that I received a mild concussion for my efforts. But bygones and bridge-water and all that. This time, I offer a white flag.” 

Keith narrowed his eyes. “Why...?”

For once, Lotor looked somewhat uncomfortable. With faux nonchalance, he nervously picked at his glittery lavender fingernails. “Can’t a man just want to be charitable and kind-hearted without being grilled for it?”

“No,” Keith answered curtly. 

Lotor huffed. “Fine!” He narrowed his eyes and practically hissed out between clenched teeth, “Because I hate my godforsaken parents. My brute of a father was the reason I could barely walk for a month. And because... I haven’t forgotten what you did for me... when, with James...” Lotor rapidly lost steam and trailed off into a mumble, suddenly acutely aware of their sizable audience. But Keith understood.

“O- oh. Anyone would’ve done the same. But uh, you’re- you’re welcome, I guess.” 

Both stood awkwardly for a moment before Lotor cleared his throat. “Anyway, do you want this or not?” he said, holding out a flash drive that Matt at once snatched with alarming speed.

“What is it?”

“Everything the police would need to charge my parents with the murder of a certain Krolia Kogane and Stephen Kogane.” Keith stiffened. “Use it, keep it, do whatever you wish with it. As far as I’m concerned, whatever you do would only be that witch and her beast’s just desserts.”

“How did you know?” Keith’s voice faltered. 

“The one blessing of being that couple’s sprog: I’m privy to all their dirty laundry. I suppose that was their first mistake.” His gaze hardened. “Bear in mind, this will be the last thing I can do for you concerning those two. I made it clear that I had given you the information and they were at your mercy. I wouldn’t be surprised if they had already taken the first plane out of the country. But perhaps Interpol could do something?” 

Keith felt his eyes water as he gently shook his head. “That’s alright. It’s enough to know that those I care about are safe from them... Thank you, Lotor.” 

The other man’s mouth twisted slightly in discomfort. “No problem... Keith.” 

Keith’s eyes widened, but Lotor was already halfway to the door. He hesitated in the doorway, wrestling quietly with a thought, then looked back at Keith and said lowly, “For what it’s worth, I’m sorry about your parents. I’ve heard of the renowned Krolia and Tex Kogane - they were great musicians.” 

Keith smiled sadly. “They were even better parents.” 

Lotor gave one brusque, awkward nod, then he was gone. 

Keith sank onto his bed, almost immediately feeling Shiro’s warm arms wrap around him. 

“Oh my god Keith, he wasn’t kidding,” said Matt. 

_ “Matt! What the hell? You just plugged it in? You don’t know what could be on it!”  _

_ “Relax Pidge, this laptop’s one of my throwaways, and obviously air-gapped.”  _ He rolled his eyes.  _ “Just who do you think has been taking care of Shiro’s security all this time?” _

She gaped.  _ “I knew he had someone good, but my own brother...” _

He snickered. “Anyway, Lotor was telling the truth. There’s enough here to bury the two in felony charges.” He whistled low. “They’ve been busy.” 

“Do you realize what this means, Shiro?” said Allura with excitement from where she stood looking over Matt’s shoulder. 

“You won’t have to worry about Zarkon and Haggar outing you anymore,” Pidge answered for him with a devilish grin. 

“You can reveal yourself as Takashi,” Keith smiled fondly. “If you’re ready.” 

“We can stop worrying,” Shiro sighed in relief. 

“We can start planning the wedding!”

Everyone turned to look at Hunk and his raised arms.

“What? I’m tired of constantly having to worry about someone dying or going to jail. It’ll be nice to worry about something pleasant, for once.” 

~~~

A few days later, Keith gave his press release, the burn scar on his cheek unapologetically prominent. With Kolivan and Thace’s careful proofing help, he finally introduced himself to the world as Keith Kogane, son of Krolia and Tex Kogane, previously known as ‘Akira,’ presently engaged to Takashi Shirogane of the Shirogane family of Paris. The media storm was unparalleled. Even the other members of Team Voltron started receiving public attention, much to Pidge’s dismay, and Lance’s delight. 

They all tried to avoid the news, the podcasts, and the late-night talk shows for weeks, but more than anything they tried to shield Shiro from the blitz as the journalists slowly but surely uncovered his POW past and brought it forward for the world to see. There were more panic attacks for Keith to help him through and more late-night talks after stress-induced nightmares, but this time Shiro also had more help. The friends wasted no time circling the wagons to help their new addition in whatever way was needed. Through some unspoken agreement, all the members of Team Voltron somehow managed it so that on any given night at least one of them was ready to immediately come over with a hot cup of tea and a listening ear whenever it all got to be too much.

Keith had been worried at first about the team accepting Shiro after months of demonizing ‘the Phantom of the Opera,’ but Shiro’s simple sweetness and charm soon won them all over. He fell into place as if he had always been one of them - he probably fit in with them better than Keith did, the latter thought fondly. It helped that from the moment Pidge had learned that Shiro was the one who sacrificed himself for her brother, she had completely accepted him as a second sibling. For all their talk of ethics and murder, Keith was pretty sure she would kill for Shiro now, and hesitate far less than Shiro did. It made him wonder if something about him naturally drew that type: Pidge, Kolivan, Thace, Shiro... 

Hunk, with his warm heart, had immediately brought Shiro into the fold, keeping him busy during particularly nasty media days with talk of their favorite breakfast recipes and of the concerto for solo bass that Shiro had promised he would write for Hunk. Lance’s loyalty was won the moment that Shiro was the only one at team dinner one night who laughed at his old pun about the lightworks at a party being “lit.” Shiro had actually cried tears of laughter at that stupid joke, to the utter bafflement of most of the others at the table, and Lance positively  _ glowed _ , saying he had finally found someone who appreciated his genius. Shiro had nodded profusely while wiping his eyes, still cackling like a madman. 

Even Allura came around eventually, when Coran finally disclosed his history with Shiro and his family. Like Allura’s father Alfor, Shiro’s parents had also been close with Coran. Coran and Alfor had been part of the orchestra and the ballet, respectively, and Shiro’s parents had been long-time patrons of the opera house. They all met before Krolia and Tex even arrived at the Palais. 

“Why didn’t you tell me?” Allura said, half-stunned. 

“You were so little when Alfor died... Shiro’s parents were just some work-friends of your father’s, what was the use in bringing them up?” Coran’s normally ebullient face was somber. “I certainly didn’t expect all you children to come together as you did. If I didn’t know any better, I’d say it was fate! Or so my tarot reading said.” He cleared his throat. “When his parents died, Shiro went through a... difficult time, poor chap. They were the last family he had left, and to lose them both at once - it was terrible. I checked in on him as much as I could, but for a while I truly feared... Anyway! Eventually he had the idea to move into the opera house to feel nearer to them, to the music they had always loved so much. I helped him bring things in from the outside and watched as he slowly retreated further and further into his sanctuary, and into himself. Then, one day, everything changed. That was around the time Keith started gaining fame. Shiro came to me suddenly, saying he had found Keith Kogane. I had sometimes watched over the two of them, you see, when they were little (sweet boys, they were - inseparable as a pack of yalmors). Keith was going by ‘Akira’ by then, but Shiro recognized him right away when he saw the interviews. Something about cheekbones and a telltale fidget.” He waved his arms ambiguously. 

“I suggested he get in touch, but he refused, satisfied with following Keith’s career through news articles and tv specials. So he was immediately aware, of course, when Akira announced he was going to collaborate with the Opera Populaire for a season.” Coran chuckled warmly. “He was so nervous about accidentally running into him. Which was exactly what happened, of course. Shiro always kept to the abandoned parts of the Palais, but for some reason those were the very parts that Keith liked to frequent. One night, he told me, Shiro was passing through the hidden passages in the walls, as usual. He didn’t expect to run into him, but apparently Keith heard him singing, and called out to him and, well... I suppose those two were always meant to come back together.

“From that day on, Shiro changed. He finished his opera. He started visiting his old house again. He resumed his parents’ regular donations to the Palais under the pseudonym ‘Raoul.’ It did the heart good to see him blossom again. And I suspect Keith played no small role in that...”

“Coran...” uttered Allura with a soft hum. After a while, she spoke. “I never did thank you for all you’ve done for me since my father died, did I?”

“No thanks are required, my dear. Watching over you, Shiro, even Keith for the small amount of time he’s been with us... You know, I never did get around to having children of my own, despite the incessant demand for Coran Coran, The Gorgeous Man.” Allura chuckled. “But you children...” He didn’t even finish the sentence before breaking down in tears. 

Allura patted his back as he smeared snot all over her favorite pastel pink cardigan. “There, there... And Coran, we’re in our thirties.” 

“You’ll always be my lovely girl!” he blubbered. 

She sighed with a patient smile and made a mental note to just buy a new cardigan next weekend. 

~~~

Despite months of Hunk’s excited planning and his needling the others to follow his Pinterest board, the wedding ended up having to be a small courthouse affair due to the global scrutiny Keith and Shiro were under, as well as Keith’s refusal to wait “what could be years” for enough of the hype to die down. 

“I’m marrying him within the year, or so help me I’m kidnapping him and eloping,” he had protested early on during one of their regular team brunches. 

“Dude please, don’t make me have to witness that pleased-as-punch blush on Shiro over there. I haven’t had nearly enough mimosas for that yet,” Lance moaned. 

“But Keith, don’t you want to have those cool aqua-colored custom lemonade drinks? And the braided-rose archway? And I’m still working on developing a special cake recipe with a cherry-infused core-”

“Nope. No way. If it was up to me, we would be getting hitched  _ tomorrow. _ This was the compromise.” Keith crossed his arms. 

They eventually succeeded in talking him into waiting the better part of a year so that Pidge and Matt’s parents could plan around their work schedules and attend, Matt delivering with a cheery smile the rather ominous warning that,  _ “If Sam and Colleen Holt don’t get to attend the union of two people they consider sons, things will be bad for everyone involved.” _ Behind Keith and Shiro’s backs, he shot a conspiratorial wink at Hunk.

So it was that Hunk was able to get his way with most of the wedding party design, somehow managing to actualize nearly his entire Pinterest board into one small, elegant backyard reception at the Shirogane mansion after the courthouse signing. It was simple, it was private, and it was perfect in their eyes. Only the Voltron team, the Shirogane household, the Holts, Coran, Kolivan, and Thace were invited... as well as Lotor and James, who not only actually attended but gifted the happy couple a very generous honeymoon travel package that made Lance drool. 

Keith threw his bouquet behind him with suspiciously accurate precision, having it land straight between Allura and Pidge where they stood side by side. With great reluctance, he was persuaded to also throw (though certainly not wear) a ridiculous sparkly magenta garter emblazoned with the words, “I’m enGayged,” a gift from Lance. In what he swore was an innocent coincidence, he blindly launched it straight into Lotor’s face. James blushed. 

At the end of the night, while the guests enjoyed the faux-wood dance floor that had been laid out on the grass beneath the strings of fairy lights, Keith beckoned Shiro with a single, scorching look to a secluded corner behind the great linden tree in the mansion’s backyard. Shiro was helpless to follow. With a grunt, he found himself pushed up roughly against the bark, lips captured in a desperate kiss that slowly grew gentle and loving as the lithe body in his arms began to subtly shake. 

Shiro ran his hands soothingly down the two slender arms that had pulled him from his own personal hell and into a happiness that he had not dared hope for during the times in his life when everything around him seemed to lose meaning. Keith drew back ever so slightly from the now-lazy kiss. 

“Hey,” Shiro whispered, gazing fondly into ever-mesmerizing violet eyes. “What’s wrong, Monsieur Shirogane?” 

Keith let out an amused puff of air. “Nothing. Everything’s perfect, actually. Finally. I wish we could just live forever in this one moment.”

His husband hummed, still running his hands up and down Keith’s arms in a rhythmic motion. “Hmm, that doesn’t sound too fun. Then we wouldn’t be able to go about adopting those five cats like we planned to. Maybe even a  _ human  _ baby, too, while we’re at it.” 

Keith laughed again, harder, and slapped the back of his hand lightly against the delicious, delicious pecs that had started this whole mess- no, no, bad thought, that would come later. Now wasn’t the time; there were still people around, after all. He shook the images from his head and looked up into Shiro’s beautiful quicksilver eyes. His husband’s quicksilver eyes, he thought giddily. “You know, I had another one of those dreams last night.” 

Shiro’s smile faded a bit. “The hallway again?” 

“Yeah, but, it was different this time,” he replied in a half-whisper as he laid his head against his husband’s shoulder. Shiro’s hands moved to caressing circles onto his back. “At first I thought it was the same old ‘Shiro Dream’ again. There was that feeling of pride again. I thought it was -as usual- pride about showing you off but, you weren’t there. It was just me, feeling proud for some reason, and then I realized it  _ wasn’t _ just me. It was them, too. They were...” He swallowed. “They were proud, too. Proud of  _ me _ ...” He felt Shiro swipe his thumb over the wetness under his eye.

“Of course, of course they would be, baby. They  _ are _ .”

“I spent so long feeling like I was just living in their shadow, reaching up, trying and failing to even  _ touch _ the long coattails of their legacy. But now... It’s not so much that I feel I’ve achieved that; I just, don’t feel like I  _ have to _ . Now I think... that I’m just me, and maybe that’s enough.”

“More than enough,” Shiro agreed as he pressed a kiss into the inkwell locks he loved so much. 

They stood like that for a few minutes, arms wrapped around each other and swaying slightly to the music and laughter that rang across the yard. 

“You kept your promise,” Shiro said finally, so quietly that Keith wasn’t sure if he had meant to say it out loud. 

Keith made a questioning noise. 

“You swore that you would marry me-” 

“-Even if you were no longer as ‘pretty’ when you grew up,” Keith finished with a grin. “So this whole time, that little spitfire in your story was me, huh? You ass. Do you have any idea how jealous I was every time you talked about it? I felt so pathetic, being jealous of a little kid.” 

Shiro matched his grin. “You were the fiance all along - what a plot twist!” He looked up in thought. “I guess technically you proposed before I did.” 

“Little me was a lucky little shit, never having to risk the non-condition of my proposal,” he said, lovingly running a pale finger over the scar across Shiro’s nose. 

Shiro tilted his head in confusion, looking impossibly even more adorable. 

“Because you’re even prettier now than you were as a kid,” he clarified, letting his gaze rake hungrily over his husband’s body in an unabashed show of appreciation. Shiro  _ needed  _ to know how beautiful he was, inside and out. “I would know; I now remember what you looked like back then. And I must say, Little Keith had good taste.” 

His bulky, manly husband flushed like a schoolgirl and rolled his eyes, failing to suppress a smile. “Flattery will get you nowhere, Keith Shirogane.”

“Not even into those pants?”

“ _ Definitely _ not there - these were steam-pressed. I still remember the last pair of nice pants you ruined with your lecherous ways.” 

“I don’t remember you complaining at the time,” Keith retorted cheekily.

They shared a look - amusement, joy, lust, love all contained within a single silent moment without words or even notes. Soon their guests would come looking for them. Soon they would have to emerge from behind the linden tree like the guilty-looking sweetheart classmates that Keith had always envied when he was an angry, lonely high school boy. Soon they would be pulled into more hugs from friends, family, then made to have third helpings of Hunk’s mouth-watering wedding cake, or beleaguered by Matt and his ‘professional camera,’ or commandeered into a dance by Lance, Pidge, and Allura. Soon they would be once again wrapped up in the warm, effusive love of the people they most cared for. 

But right now, it was only Shiro and Keith. The rest of the world fell away, a mere backdrop beyond the space that was the two of them and their shared existence. They leaned their foreheads together and closed their eyes as they breathed each other in. Below the din of the speakers and the revelers, Shiro hummed a gentle tune as familiar to Keith as the sun in the sky and the gray in his eyes. 

“Keith...” Ever so softly, Shiro kissed him. “You saved me.” 

Keith smiled blissfully and returned it. “We saved each other.” 

#  **THE END**

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you everyone, for coming on this journey with me! Special thanks again to my amazing, wonderful betareader [Maryliz2121](/users/Maryliz2121/). And to all my fellow Sheithers out there: thank you for being such a loving, supportive community and keeping alive the loving, supportive magic that is Sheith. <3


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